XLVIII. THE PSEUDO-ARISTOTLE…

XLVIII. THE PSEUDO-ARISTOTLE

Alexander and Aristotle--Spurious writings ascribed to Aristotle--Aristotle and experiment--Aristotle and alchemy: Meteorology and On colors--Works of alchemy ascribed to Aristotle--Aristotle and Alexander as alchemists--Aristotle and astrology--Astrology and magic in the Theology and De Pomo of Aristotle--Liber de causis proprietatum elementorum et planetarum--Other astrological treatises ascribed to Aristotle--Aristotle and 250 volumes of the Indians--Works on astrological images--And on necromantic images--Alexander as an astrologer--Aristotle and spirits--On plants and the Lapidary--Virtues of gems--Stories of Alexander and of Socrates--Alexander’s submarine--Arabian tales of Alexander--A magic horn--More stories of Alexander and gems--Story of Alexander’s belt--The royal Lapidary of Wenzel II of Bohemia--Chiromancy and Physiognomy of Aristotle--The Secret of Secrets--Its textual history--The Latin translations of John of Spain and Philip--Philip’s preface--Prominence of occult science--Absence of mysticism--Discussion of kingship--Medical discussion--Astrology--Story of the two boys--Virtues of stones and herbs, incantations and amulets--Thirteenth century scepticism--Number and alchemy--The poisonous maiden--The Jew and the Magus.

[Sidenote: Alexander and Aristotle.]

In a previous chapter we have seen what a wide currency the legend of Alexander had both in east and west in the later Roman Empire and early middle ages, and how with Alexander was associated the magician and astrologer Nectanebus. We also saw that by about 800 A. D. at least a separate Letter of Alexander to Aristotle on the Marvels of India was current in the Latin west, and in the present chapter it is especially to the Pseudo-Aristotle and his connection with Alexander and India, rather than to the Pseudo-Callisthenes, that we turn. The tremendous historical importance of the career of Alexander the Great and of the writings of Aristotle impressed itself perhaps even unduly upon both the Arabian and the medieval mind. The personal connection between the two men--Aristotle was for a time Alexander’s tutor--was seized upon and magnified. Pliny in his Natural History had stated that Alexander had empowered Aristotle to send two thousand men to different parts of the world to test by experience all things on the face of the earth.[755] This account of their scientific co-operation was enlarged upon by spurious writings associated with their names like the letter on the marvels of India.[756] With the introduction into western Europe in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries of many genuine works of Aristotle unknown to the early middle ages, which had possessed only certain of his logical treatises, there also came into circulation a number of spurious writings ascribed to him.

[Sidenote: Spurious writings ascribed to Aristotle.]

It is not surprising that many spurious works were attributed to Aristotle in the middle ages, when we remember that his writings came to them for the most part indirectly through corrupt translations, and that some writing from so great a master was eagerly looked for upon every subject in which they were interested. It seemed to them that so encyclopedic a genius must have touched on all fields of knowledge and they often failed to realize that in Aristotle’s time the departments of learning had been somewhat different from their own and that new interests and doctrine had developed since then. There was also a tendency to ascribe to Aristotle any work of unknown or uncertain authorship. At the close of the twelfth century Alexander Neckam[757] lists among historic instances of envy Aristotle’s holding back from posterity certain of his most subtle writings, which he ordered should be buried with him. At the same time he so guarded the place of his sepulcher, whether by some force of nature or power of art or prodigy of magic is uncertain, that no one has yet been able to approach it, although some think that Antichrist will be able to inspect these books when he comes. Roger Bacon in the thirteenth century believed that Aristotle had written over a thousand works and complained bitterly because certain treatises, which were probably really apocryphal, had not been translated into Latin.[758] Indeed, some of the works ascribed to Aristotle in the Oriental and Mohammedan worlds were never translated into Latin, such as the astrological De impressionibus coelestibus which Bacon mentions, or the Syriac text which K. Ahrens edited in 1892 with a German translation as “Das Buch der Naturgegenstände”; or first appeared in Latin guise after the invention of printing, as was the case with the so-called Theology of Aristotle,[759] a work which was little more than a series of extracts from the Enneads of Plotinus.[760] Some treatises attributed to Aristotle in medieval Latin do not bear especially upon our investigation, such as Grammar which Grosseteste is said to have translated from Greek.[761]

[Sidenote: Aristotle and experiment.]

For our purposes the Pseudo-Aristotelian writings may be sub-divided under seven heads: experiment, alchemy, astrology, spirits, occult virtues of stones and herbs, chiromancy and physiognomy, and last the famous Secret of Secrets. Under the first of these heads may be put a treatise on the conduct of waters, which consists of a series of experiments in siphoning and the like illustrated in the manuscript by lettered and colored figures and diagrams.[762] In a Vatican manuscript it is perhaps more correctly ascribed to Philo of Byzantium.

[Sidenote: Aristotle and alchemy: Meteorology and On colors.]

From experiment to alchemy is an easy step, for the alchemists experimented a good deal in the period which we are now considering. The fourth book of the Meteorology of Aristotle, which, if not a genuine portion of that work, at least goes back to the third century before Christ,[763] has been called a manual of chemistry,[764] and apparently is the oldest such extant. Its doctrines are also believed to have been influential in the development of alchemy; and there were passages in this fourth book which led men later to regard Aristotle as favorable to the doctrine of the transmutation of metals. Gerard of Cremona had translated only the first three books of the Meteorology; the fourth was supplied from a translation from the Greek made by Henricus Aristippus who died in 1162; to this fourth book were added three chapters translated by Alfred of England or of Sareshel from the Arabic,[765] apparently of Avicenna.[766] These additions of Alfred from Avicenna discussed the formation of metals but attacked the alchemists.[767] Vincent of Beauvais[768] and Albertus Magnus[769] were both aware, however, that this attack upon the alchemists was probably not by Aristotle. The short treatise On colors,[770] which is included in so many medieval manuscript collections of the works of Aristotle in Latin,[771] by its very title would suggest to medieval readers that he had been interested in the art of alchemy, although its actual contents deal only in small part with dyes and tinctures. Its form and contents are not regarded as Aristotle’s, but it was perhaps by someone of the Peripatetic school. Thus works which, if not by Aristotle himself, at least had been written in Greek long before the medieval period, gave medieval readers the impression that Aristotle was favorable to alchemy.

[Sidenote: Works of alchemy ascribed to Aristotle.]

It is therefore not surprising that works of alchemy appeared in medieval Latin under Aristotle’s name. The names of Plato and Aristotle had headed the lists of alchemists in Greek manuscripts although no works ascribed to Aristotle have been preserved in the same.[772] Berthelot, however, speaks of a pseudo-Aristotle in Arabic,[773] and in an Oxford manuscript of the thirteenth century under the name of Aristotle appears a treatise On the twelve waters of the secret river said to be “translated from Arabic into Latin.”[774] In the preface the author promises that whoever becomes skilled, adept, and expert in these twelve waters will never lose hope nor be depressed by want. He regards this treatise as the chief among his works, since he has learned these waters by experiment. They are all chemical rather than medical; a brief “chapter” or paragraph is devoted to each. In another manuscript at the Bodleian two brief tracts are ascribed to Aristotle; one describes the seven metals, the other deals with transmutation.[775] In a single manuscript at Munich both a theoretical treatise in medicine and alchemy and a Practica are attributed to Aristotle, and in two other manuscripts he is credited with the Book of Seventy Precepts which sometimes is ascribed to Geber.[776] Thomas of Cantimpré cites Aristotle in the Lumen luminum as saying that the best gold is made from yellow copper ore and the urine of a boy, but Thomas hastens to add that such gold is best in color rather than in substance.[777] The translation of the Lumen luminum is ascribed both to Michael Scot and brother Elias.[778] Aristotle is quoted several times in De alchimia, ascribed to Albertus Magnus, but only in the later “Additions” to it, where Roger Bacon also is cited, is the specific title Liber de perfecto magisterio given as Aristotle’s.[779] Sometimes works of alchemy were very carelessly ascribed to Aristotle, when it is perfectly evident from the works themselves that they could not have been written by him.[780]

[Sidenote: Aristotle and Alexander as alchemists.]

The alchemical discoveries and writings ascribed to Aristotle are often associated in some way with Alexander the Great as well. In one manuscript John of Spain’s translation of the Secret of Secrets is followed by a description of the virtues and compositions of four stones “which Aristotle sent to Alexander the Great.”[781] It seems obvious that these are philosopher’s stones and not natural gems. The Liber ignium of Marcus Grecus, composed in the thirteenth or early fourteenth century, ascribes to Aristotle the discovery of two marvelous kinds of fires. One, which he discovered while traveling with Alexander the king, will burn for a year without cessation. The other, in the composition of which observance of the dog-days is requisite, “Aristotle asserts will last for nine years.”[782] A collection of chemical experiments by a Nicholas, of whom we shall have more to say in a later chapter, gives “a fire which Aristotle discovered with Alexander for obscure places.”[783] A letter of Aristotle to Alexander in a collection of alchemical tracts is hardly worth noting, as it is only seven lines long, but it is interesting to observe that it cites Aristotle’s Meteorology.[784] Perhaps by a mistake one or two alchemical treatises are ascribed to Alexander rather than Aristotle.[785]

[Sidenote: Aristotle and astrology.]

Aristotle’s genuine works give even more encouragement to the pretensions of astrology than to those of alchemy. His opinion that the four elements were insufficient to explain natural phenomena and his theory of a fifth essence were favorable to the belief in occult virtue and the influence of the stars upon inferior objects. In his work on generation[786] he held that the elements alone were mere tools without a workman; the missing agent is supplied by the revolution of the heavens. In the twelfth book of the Metaphysics he described the stars and planets as eternal and acting as intermediaries between the prime Mover and inferior beings. Thus they are the direct causes of all life and action in our world. Charles Jourdain regarded the introduction of the Metaphysics into western Europe at the opening of the thirteenth century as a principal cause for the great prevalence of astrology from that time on, the other main cause being the translation of Arabian astrological treatises.[787] Jourdain did not duly appreciate the great hold which astrology already had in the twelfth century, but it is nevertheless true that in the new Aristotle astrology found further support.

[Sidenote: Astrology and magic in the Theology and De pomo of Aristotle.]

Astrology crops out here and there in most of the spurious works extant under Aristotle’s name, just as it does in medieval learning everywhere. One section of a dozen pages in the Theology discusses the influence of the stars upon nature and the working of magic by making use of these celestial forces and the natural attraction which things have for one another. It regards artificial magic as a fraud but natural and astrological magic as a reality. However, as in the original text of Plotinus which the Theology follows, it is only the animal soul which is affected by magic and the man of impulse who is moved thereby; the thinking man can free himself from its influence by use of the rational soul. In the treatise, De pomo,[788] which seems not to have been translated into Latin until the thirteenth century under Manfred,[789] Aristotle on his death bed, holding in his hand an apple from which the treatise takes its title, is represented as telling his disciples why a philosopher need not fear death and repudiating the doctrines of the mortality of the soul and eternity of the universe. He also tells how the Creator made the spheres and placed lucid stars in each and gave them the virtue of ruling over this inferior world and causing good and evil and life or death. They do not, however, do this of themselves, but men at first thought so and erroneously worshiped the stars until the time of Noah who was the first to recognize the Creator of the spheres.[790]

[Sidenote: Liber de causis proprietatum elementorum et planetarum.]

There are also attributed to Aristotle treatises primarily astrological. A “Book on the Properties of the Elements and of the Planets” is cited under his name by Peter of Abano at the end of the thirteenth century in his work on poisons,[791] by Peter d’Ailly in his Vigintiloquium[792] written in 1414, and by Pico della Mirandola, who declares it spurious, in his work against astrology written at the close of the fifteenth century. D’Ailly and Pico cite it in regard to the theory of great conjunctions; Abano, for a tale of Socrates and two dragons which we shall repeat later. It is probable that all these citations were from the paraphrase of and commentary on the work by Albertus Magnus[793] who accepted it as a genuine writing of Aristotle. We shall consider its contents in our chapter upon Albertus Magnus.

[Sidenote: Other astrological treatises ascribed to Aristotle.]

In a manuscript of the Cotton collection in the British Museum is a work of some length upon astrology ascribed to Aristotle.[794] After a discussion of general principles in which the planets, signs, and houses are treated, there are separate books upon the subjects of nativities,[795] and of elections and interrogations.[796] In a Paris manuscript a treatise on interrogations is ascribed in a marginal heading to “Aristoteles Milesius, a Peripatetic physician.”[797] In the Cotton Manuscript in commentaries which then follow, and which are labelled as commentaries “upon the preceding treatise” Ptolemy is mentioned rather than Aristotle.[798] In an astrological manuscript of the fifteenth century at Grenoble written in French, works of Messahala and Zaël translated for Charles V of France are preceded by “a book of judicial astrology according to Aristotle,” which opens with “the preface of the last translator,” and is in four parts.[799] Perhaps both the above-mentioned manuscripts contain, like a third manuscript at Munich, “The book of judgments which is said by Albert in his Speculum to be Aristotle’s.”[800] This work also occurs in a manuscript at Erfurt.[801] Roger Bacon was much impressed by an astrological treatise ascribed to Aristotle entitled De impressionibus coelestibus, and told Pope Clement IV that it was “superior to the entire philosophy of the Latins and can be translated by your order.”[802]

[Sidenote: Aristotle and two hundred and fifty volumes of the Indians.]

A treatise found in two manuscripts of the Bodleian Library bears the titles, Commentary of Aristotle on Astrology, and The book of Aristotle from two hundred and fifty-five volumes of the Indians, containing a digest of all problems, whether pertaining to the sphere or to genethlialogy.[803] From the text itself and the preface of Hugo Sanctelliensis, the twelfth century translator from Arabic into Latin, addressed to his lord, Michael, bishop of Tarazona, we see that the work is neither entirely by Aristotle nor from the books of the Indians but is a compilation by someone who draws or pretends to draw from some 250 or 255 books[804] of the philosophers, including in addition to treatises by both Aristotle and the Indians, 13 books by Hermes, 13 by Doronius (Dorotheus?), 4 by Ptolemy, one by Democritus, two by Plato, 44 by the Babylonians, 7 by Antiochus, and others by authors whose names are unfamiliar to me and probably misspelled in the manuscripts. In one of the works of Aristotle of which the present work is supposed to make use, there are said to have been described the nativities of twelve thousand men, collected in an effort to establish an experimental basis for astrology.[805] It is not so surprising that the present work bears Aristotle’s name, since Hugh had promised his patron Michael, in the prologue to his translation of the Geometry of Hanus ben Hanne,[806] that if life endured and opportunity was given he would next set to work as ordered by his patron, not only upon Haly’s commentaries on the Quadripartite and Almagest of Ptolemy, but also upon a certain general commentary by Aristotle on the entire art of astrology.

[Sidenote: Works on astrological images.]

The Secret of Secrets of the Pseudo-Aristotle is immediately followed in one manuscript by chapters or treatises addressed to Alexander and entitled, Of ideas and forms, Of the impression of forms, and Of images and rings.[807] The theory, very like that of Alkindi, is maintained that “all forms are ruled by supercelestial forms through the spirits of the spheres” and that incantations and images receive their force from the spheres. The seven planets pass on these supercelestial ideas and forms to our inferior world. By selecting proper times for operating one can work good or ill by means of the rays and impressions of the planets. The scientific investigator who properly concentrates and fixes intent, desire, and appetite upon the desired goal can penetrate hidden secrets of secrets and occult science both universal and particular. The writer goes on to emphasize the importance of understanding all the different positions and relationships of the heavenly bodies and also the distribution of terrestrial objects under the planets. He then describes an astrological image which will cause men to reverence and obey you, will repel your enemies in terror, afflict the envious, send visions, and perform other marvelous and stupefying feats too numerous to mention.

[Sidenote: And on necromantic images.]

As the Speculum astronomiae of Albertus Magnus listed a Book of Judgments by Aristotle among deserving works of astronomy and astrology, so in its list of evil books dealing with necromantic images appear a treatise by Hermes addressed to Aristotle and opening, “Aristotle said, ‘You have seen me, O Hermes,’” and a treatise ascribed to Aristotle with the sinister title, Death of the Soul, opening, “Said Aristotle to King Alexander, ‘If you want to perceive.’” This treatise the Speculum calls “the worst of all” the evil books on images. Roger Bacon, too, alludes to it by title as filled with figments of the magicians, but does not name Aristotle as author.[808] Peter of Abano in his Lucidator follows the Speculum astronomiae in listing it among depraved, obscene, and detestable works.[809]

[Sidenote: Alexander as an astrologer.]

Alexander himself, as well as Aristotle, had some medieval reputation as an astrologer. We have already seen[810] in the tenth and eleventh century manuscripts of the Mathematica of Alhandreus, supreme astrologer, that “Alexander of Macedon” was more than once cited as an authority, and that there were also given “Excerpts from the books of Alexander, astrologer, king,” and a “Letter of Argafalan to Alexander.” Different from this, moreover, was the Mathematica of Alexander, supreme astrologer, found in a thirteenth century manuscript, in which from the movements of the planets through the signs one is instructed how to foretell prosperous and adverse journeys, abundance and poverty, misfortune or death of a friend, or to discover stolen articles, sorceries, buried treasure and so forth.[811] A treatise on seven herbs related to the seven planets is sometimes ascribed to Alexander,[812] but perhaps more often to Flaccus Africanus, as we saw in Chapter 46, and at least once to Aristotle.[813]

[Sidenote: Aristotle and spirits.]

The association of astrological images with spirits of the spheres in one of the above-mentioned works ascribed to Aristotle has already brought us to the border-line of our next topic, Aristotle and spirits. Under this caption may be placed a work found in a fifteenth century manuscript.[814] It also is in part astrological and is associated with the name of Hermes as well as of Aristotle. Its title runs, The book of the spiritual works of Aristotle, or the book Antimaquis, which is the book of the secrets of Hermes: wonderful things can be accomplished by means of this book and ’tis the ancient book of the seven planets. The treatise opens, “To every people and clime pertains a group of spirits.” It then maps out these regions of different spirits in accordance with the planets and signs of the zodiac. Apparently this is the same work as that which Hunain ibn Ishak translated into Arabic and of which he says, “Among the works of Aristotle which we have found and translated from Greek into Arabic was The book of the Causes of Spirituals which has Hermes for author.... It is the book in which Aristotle treats of the causes of spirituals, talismans, the art of their operation, and how to hinder it, ordered after the seven climates.”[815] It was probably some such spurious work that William of Auvergne had in mind when he spoke of Aristotle’s boast that a spirit had descended unto him from the sphere of Venus.[816]

[Sidenote: On plants and the Lapidary.]

No genuine work of Aristotle on vegetables or minerals has come down to us to accompany his celebrated History of Animals, but supposititious writings were soon found by the Arabs to fill this gap. On plants a brief treatise by Nicolaus Damascenus passed for Aristotle’s. Alfred of Sarchel translated it from Arabic into Latin,[817] presumably before the close of the twelfth century, since he dedicated it to Roger of Hereford, and Albertus Magnus expanded its two short books into seven long ones in his De vegetabilibus et plantis. There also existed in Arabic a Lapidary ascribed to Aristotle,[818] which we have heard cited in the ninth century by Costa ben Luca. Ruska believes the work to be of Syrian and Persian origin,[819] although one Latin text professes to have been originally translated from Greek into Syriac.[820] Valentin Rose regarded it as the basis of all subsequent Arabic mineralogy, but found only two Latin manuscripts of it.[821] Albertus Magnus in his Minerals confesses that, although he had sought diligently in divers regions of the world, he had seen only excerpts from Aristotle’s work. But another writer of the thirteenth century, Arnold of Saxony, cites translations of Aristotle on stones both by Dioscorides, which would seem sheer nonsense, and by Gerard, presumably of Cremona. Gerard’s translation occurs in one of Rose’s manuscripts; the other seems to give a version translated from the Hebrew.

[Sidenote: Virtues of gems.]

In Gerard’s translation, a work marked by puerile Latin style, the Lapidary of Aristotle is about equally devoted to marvelous properties of stones and tales of Alexander the Great. After some general discussion of stones and their wonderful properties, particular gems are taken up. The gesha brings misfortune. Its wearer sleeps poorly, has many worries, many altercations and law-suits. If it is hung about a boy’s neck, it makes him drivel. “There is great occult force” in the magnet, and instructions are given how to set water on fire with it. Several stones possess the property of neutralizing spells and counteracting the work of demons. With another stone the Indians make many incantations. Vultures were the first to discover the virtue of the stone filcrum coarton in hastening delivery. When a female vulture was near death from the eggs hardening in her body, the male flew off to India and brought back this stone which afforded instant relief. Another stone is so soporific that suspended about the neck it induces a sleep lasting three days and nights, and the effects of which are thrown off with difficulty even on the fourth day, when the sleeper will awake but will act as if he were intoxicated and will still seem sleepier than anyone else. Another stone prevents a horse from whinnying, if suspended from his neck.

[Sidenote: Stories of Alexander and of Socrates.]

Other gems suggest stories of Alexander. Near the frontier of India in a valley guarded by deadly serpents whose mere glance was fatal were many precious gems. Alexander disposed of the serpents by erecting mirrors in which they might stare themselves to death, and he then secured the gems by employing the carcasses of sheep in the manner which we have already heard described by Epiphanius.[822] A somewhat similar tale is told of Socrates by Albertus Magnus in his commentary on the pseudo-Aristotelian work on the properties of the elements and planets.[823] In the reign of Philip of Macedon, who is himself described as a philosopher and astronomer, the road between two mountains in Armenia became so poisoned that no one could pass. Philip vainly inquired the cause from his sages until Socrates came to the rescue and, by erecting a tower as high as the mountains with a steel mirror on top of it, saw two dragons polluting the air. The mere glance of these dragons was apparently not deadly, for men in air-tight armor went in and killed them. The same story is told by William of St. Cloud, who composed astronomical tables based upon his own observations from about 1285 to 1321, in which he detected errors in the earlier tables of Thebit, Toulouse, and Toledo.[824] In Peter of Abano’s treatise on poisons,[825] however, although he too cites the Pseudo-Aristotle On the causes of the elements, the mirror has become a glass cave in which Socrates ensconces himself to observe the serpents. A Lapidary dedicated to King Wenzel II of Bohemia tells of Socrates’ killing a dragon by use of quicksilver.[826] That Socrates also shared the medieval reputation of Aristotle and Plato for astrology and divination we have already seen from the Prenostica Socratis Basilei.

[Sidenote: Alexander’s submarine.]

Similar to Abano’s tale of Socrates in the glass cave is the story told a century earlier by Alexander Neckam of Alexander himself. So sedulous an investigator of nature was the Macedonian, says Neckam, that he went down in a glass vessel to observe the natures and customs of the fishes. He would seem to have remained submerged for some time, since Neckam informs us that he took a cock with him in order to tell when it was dawn by the bird’s crowing. This primitive submarine had at least a suggestion of war about it, since Neckam goes on to say that Alexander learned how to lay ambushes against the foe by observing one army of fishes attack another. Unfortunately, however, Alexander failed to commit to writing his observations, whether military or scientific, of deep-sea life; and Neckam grieves that very few data on the natures of fishes have come to his attention.[827] We shall hear Roger Bacon tell of Alexander’s descending to see the secrets of the deep on the authority of Ethicus.[828]

[Sidenote: Arabian tales of Alexander.]

Neckam’s account differs a good deal from the story as told by the Arabian historian, Masʿudi, in the tenth century. There we read that, when Alexander was building the city of Alexandria, monsters came from the sea every night and overthrew the walls that had been built during the day. Night watchmen proved of no avail, so Alexander had a box made ten cubits long and five wide, with glass sides fastened into the frame work by means of pitch and resin. He then entered the box with two draughtsmen, who, after it had been let down to the bottom of the sea, made exact drawings of the monsters, who had human bodies but the heads of beasts. From these sketches Alexander had images constructed and placed on pillars, and these magic figures served to keep off the monsters until the city was completed. But the effect apparently began to wear off and talismans had to be added on the pillars to prevent the monsters from coming and devouring the inhabitants, as they had begun to do again.[829] Another Arab, Abu-Shâker, of the thirteenth century, repeats a current tradition that Aristotle gave Alexander a box of wax soldiers which were nailed, with inverted spears and swords and severed bow-strings, face-downwards in the box, which in its turn was fastened by a chain. As long as the box remained in Alexander’s possession and he repeated the formulae which Aristotle taught him whenever he took the box up or put it down, he would triumph over his foes in war.[830] This reminds one of the methods of warfare employed by Alexander’s fabled natural father, Nectanebus.

[Sidenote: A magic horn.]

While we are speaking of military matters, it may be noted that in a manuscript of the thirteenth century which once belonged to an Albertus Bohemus or Beham, dean of the church at Padua, and seems to have been his note-book, we find between the Secret of Secrets of the Pseudo-Aristotle and a treatise on the significations of the moon in the signs “a delineation of a brazen horn made with marvelous art by which Alexander in time of war summoned his army from a distance of sixty miles.”[831] Such a horn “of Temistius” is mentioned in some versions of the Secret of Secrets.[832]

[Sidenote: More stories of Alexander and gems.]

But to return to other tales of Alexander in the Lapidary. Once he saw afar enchanters and enchantresses who slew and wounded the men of his army by their diabolical power until Alexander prayed to God, who revealed two stones which counteracted the sorcery. On another occasion when by Alexander’s order his barons had carried off certain gems, during the night following they suffered much insult from demons and were sore afraid, since sticks and stones were thrown about the camp by unseen hands and men were beaten without knowing whence the blows came. It thus became apparent that the demons cherished those gems as their especial property and were accustomed to perform occult operations with them of which they did not wish men to learn the secret. Alexander found that these gems would protect him from any beast, serpent, or demon, although the nocturnal experience of his barons would scarcely seem to support this last point. On a third occasion his troops were held motionless and gazed open-mouthed at certain stones, until a bird fluttered down and covered the gems with its outstretched wings. Then Alexander had his followers close their eyes and carry the stones away under cover and place them on top of the wall of one of his cities so that no one might scale the wall to spy upon the town.

[Sidenote: Story of Alexander’s belt.]

Yet another curious story of Alexander and a stone is repeated by Peter of Abano in his work on poisons[833] from a treatise “On the Nature of Serpents” which he ascribes to Aristotle. Alexander always wore a certain stone in his belt to give him good luck in his battles, but on his return from India, while bathing in the Euphrates, he removed the belt, whereupon a serpent suddenly appeared, bit the stone out of the belt, and vomited it into the river. Deprived of his talisman, Alexander presently met his death.[834]

[Sidenote: The royal Lapidary of Wenzel II of Bohemia.]

Another Lapidary, printed as Aristotle’s at Merseburg in 1473, is really a compilation of previous medieval works on the subject with the addition of some items derived from the personal knowledge or experience of the author. It was composed “to the honor of almighty God and the glory and perpetual memory of that virtuous and most glorious prince, Wenzel II, King of Bohemia” (1278-1305). As the treatise itself states, “the Lapidary of Aristotle in the recent translation from the Greek” is only one of its sources along with Avicenna, Constantinus Africanus, Albertus Magnus, and others.

[Sidenote: Chiromancy and Physiognomy of Aristotle.]

Another work which claims Aristotelian authorship only in its title is the Chiromancy of Aristotle, printed at Ulm in 1490, which quotes freely from Albertus Magnus and Avicenna. There are also brief tracts on chiromancy ascribed to Aristotle in manuscripts of the thirteenth or fourteenth century.[835] Förster has identified Polemon as the author of the Greek treatise on physiognomy ascribed to Aristotle.[836] The art of physiognomy of course professed to read character from the face or other parts of the body, and chiromancy which we have just mentioned is really a branch of it. In Latin translation the treatise was accepted as Aristotle’s by such medieval schoolmen as Albertus Magnus and Duns Scotus. There are many manuscripts of it in the British Museum, including one which perhaps dates back to the twelfth century.[837] Its popularity continued long after the invention of printing, as is shown by separate editions of it brought out at Paris in 1535 and at Wittenberg in 1538, and by commentaries upon it[838] published at Paris in 1611, at Bologna in 1621, and at Toulouse in 1636. Besides such separate manuscripts and editions of it, it was also regularly embodied in the numerous copies of the pseudo-Aristotelian work to which we next turn.

[Sidenote: The Secret of Secrets.]

Most widely influential upon the medieval mind of all the spurious works attributed to Aristotle was The Secret of Secrets. Förster enumerated two hundred and seven Latin manuscripts of it and his list is probably far from complete.[839] Gaster calls it “The most popular book of the middle ages.”[840] This is not surprising since it purports to sum up in concise form what the greatest of ancient philosophers deemed it essential for the greatest of ancient rulers to know, and since under the alluring pretense of revealing great secrets in parable and riddle it really masses together a number of the best-tested and most often repeated maxims of personal hygiene and practical philosophy, and some of the superstitions to which men have shown themselves most inclined. Every European library of consequence contains a number of copies of it. It was translated into almost every European language and was often versified, as in Lydgate’s and Burgh’s Secrees of old Philisoffres.[841] Albertus Magnus cited it as Aristotle’s;[842] Roger Bacon wrote a rather jejune commentary upon it.[843] It was printed a number of times before 1500.[844]

[Sidenote: Its textual history.]

The Secrets of Secrets is believed to be the outcome of a gradual process of compilation from very varied sources, and to have reached something like its present form by the seventh or eighth century of our era. But its chapters on physiognomy, as we have seen, go back to Polemon’s treatise, and part of its medical discussion is said to be borrowed from Diocles Caristes who wrote about 320 B. C. Some Graeco-Persian treatise is thought to be the basis of its discussion of kingship. It is also believed to have appropriated bits from popular literature to its own uses. In Arabic there is extant both a longer and a shorter version, and Gaster has edited a Hebrew text which is apparently derived from an Arabic original different from that of any Latin text. The process of successive compilation, or at least, re-editing and repeated translation which the work underwent is suggested by a series of prologues which occur at the beginning. Following the preface of the Latin translator and the table of contents comes what is called “the prologue of a certain doctor in commendation of Aristotle,”[845] in which omnipotent God is prayed to guard the king and some anonymous editor states that he has executed the mandate enjoined upon him to procure the moral work on royal conduct called The Secret of Secrets, which Aristotle, chief of philosophers, composed. After some talk about Aristotle and Alexander a second prologue begins with the sentence, “John who translated this book, son of a patrician, most skilful and faithful interpreter of languages, says.” This John appears to have been Yuhanna ibn el-Batrik, or Ibn Yahya al-Batrik, who died in 815 A. D.[846] What he says is that he searched the world over until he came to an oracle of the sun which Esculapides had constructed. There he found a solitary abstemious sage who presented him with this book which he translated from Greek into Chaldaic and thence into Arabic. This passage reminds one of Harpocration’s prefatory remarks to his daughter in the Kiranides; indeed, it is quite in the usual style of apocryphal writings.

[Sidenote: The Latin translations of John of Spain and Philip.]

In the matter of the Latin translation we are on somewhat more certain ground. John of Spain in the first half of the twelfth century seems to have translated only the medical portion.[847] Manuscripts of this partial translation are relatively few,[848] and it was presently superseded by the complete translation made either in the twelfth or early thirteenth century[849] by Philip, “the least of his clerics” for “his most excellent lord, most strenuous in the cult of the Christian religion, Guido of Valencia, glorious pontiff of the city of Tripoli.” Philip goes on to say in his dedicatory preface that it was when he was with Guido in Antioch that they found “this pearl of philosophy, ... this book which contains something useful about almost every science,” and which it pleased Guido to have translated from Arabic into Latin. Although the various printed editions and manuscripts of The Secret of Secrets in Latin vary considerably, they regularly are preceded by this ascription of the Latin translation to Philip, and usually by the other prologues afore-mentioned. Who this Philip was, other than a cleric of Tripoli, is still undetermined. If he was the same as the papal physician whom Alexander III in 1177 proposed to send on a mission to Prester John,[850] he had probably made his translation before that date. J. Wood Brown would identify him with Philip of Salerno, a royal notary whose name appears in 1200 on deeds in the kingdom of Sicily.[851] I have already suggested that possibly he translated the Kiranides.

[Sidenote: Philip’s preface.]

Returning to Philip’s preface to Guido, it may be noted that he states that Latins do not have the work, and that it is rare among the Arabs.[852] His translation is a free one since the Arabic idiom is different from the Latin. Aristotle wrote this book in response to the petition of King Alexander his disciple who demanded that Aristotle should either come to him or faithfully reveal the secrets of certain arts, namely, the motion, operation, and power of the stars in astronomy, the art of alchemy, the art of knowing natures and working enchantments, and the art of geomancy. Aristotle was too old to come in person, and although it had been his intention to conceal in every way the secrets of the said sciences, yet he did not venture to contradict the will and command of so great a lord. He hid some matters, however, under enigmas and figurative locutions. For Alexander’s convenience he divided the work into ten books, each of which is divided into chapters and headings. Philip adds that for his readers’ convenience he has collected these headings at the beginning of the work, and a table of contents follows.[853] Then come the two older prologues which we have already described, next a letter of Aristotle to Alexander on the extrinsic and intrinsic causes of his work,[854] and then with a chapter which is usually headed Distinctio regum or Reges sunt quatuor begins the discussion of kingship which is the backbone of the work.

[Sidenote: Prominence of occult science.]

It is evident from Philip’s preface that occult science also forms a leading feature in the work as known to him. Gaster, who contended that the Hebrew translation from the Arabic which he edited was as old as either John of Spain’s or Philip’s Latin translations, although the oldest of the four manuscripts which he collated for his text is dated only in 1382 A. D., made a rather misleading statement when he affirmed, “Of the astrology looming so largely in the later European recensions the Hebrew has only a faint trace.”[855] As a matter of fact some of the printed editions contain less astrology than the thirteenth century manuscripts, while Gaster’s Hebrew version has much more than “a faint trace” of astrology. But more of this later.

[Sidenote: Absence of mysticism.]

On the other hand, I cannot fully subscribe to Steinschneider’s characterization of The Secret of Secrets as “a wretched compilation of philosophical mysticism and varied superstition.”[856] Of superstition there is a great deal, but of philosophical mysticism there is practically none. Despite the title and the promise in Philip’s preface of enigmatic and figurative language, the tone of the text is seldom mystical, and its philosophy is of a very practical sort.

[Sidenote: Discussion of kingship.]

Nor can The Secret of Secrets be dismissed as merely “a wretched compilation.” Those portions which deal with kingcraft and government display shrewdness and common sense, worldly wisdom and knowledge of human nature, are not restricted by being written from any one premise or view-point, and often evince real enlightenment. Those historians who have declared the love of fame a new product of the Italian Renaissance should have read the chapter on fame in this most popular book of the middle ages, where we find such statements as that royal power ought not to be desired for its own sake but for the sole purpose of achieving fame. Other noteworthy utterances indicative of the tone and thought of the book are that “the intellect ... is the root of all things praiseworthy”; that kings should cultivate the sciences; that liberality involves respect for others’ property; that “war destroys order and devastates the lands and turns everything to chaos”; that no earthly ruler should shed blood, which is reserved for God alone, but limit his punishments to imprisonment, flogging, and torture; that the king, as Chief Justice Coke later told James I, is under the law; that taxes upon merchants should be light so that they will remain in the country and contribute to its prosperity; that his people are a king’s true treasury and that he should acquaint himself with their needs and watch over their interests.

[Sidenote: Medical discussion.]

From the medical passages of the book one would infer that the art of healing at first developed more slowly than the art of ruling in the world’s history. The medical theory of The Secret of Secrets is not of an advanced or complex sort, but is a combination of curious notions, such as that vomiting once a month or oftener is beneficial, and sensible ideas, such as that life consists of natural heat and that it is very important to keep the abdomen warm and the bowels moving regularly. Turkish baths are described for perhaps the first time in Europe, and Alexander is advised to keep his teeth and mouth clean. The well-known apothegm of Hippocrates is quoted, “I would rather eat to live than live to eat,” and Alexander is advised to cease eating while he still has an appetite.

[Sidenote: Astrology.]

Much of the advice offered to Alexander by Aristotle in The Secret of Secrets is astrological. Among those studies which the king should promote, the only one specifically mentioned is astrology, which considers “the course of the year and of the stars, the coming festivals and solemnities of the month, the course of the planets, the cause of the shortening and lengthening of days and nights, the signs of the stars which determine the future and many other things which pertain to prediction of the future.”[857] Alexander is adjured “not to rise up or sit down or eat or drink or do anything without consulting a man skilled in the art of astronomy.”[858] Later the two parts of astronomy are distinguished, that is, astronomy and astrology in our sense of the words. Alexander is further warned to put no faith in the utterances of those stupid persons who declare that the science of the stars is too difficult to master. No less stupid is the argument of others who affirm that God has foreseen and foreordained everything from eternity and that consequently all things happen of necessity and it is therefore of no advantage to predict events which cannot be avoided. For even if things happened of necessity, it would be easier to bear them by foreknowing and preparing for them beforehand, just as men make preparations against the coming of a cold winter--the familiar contention of Ptolemy. But The Secret of Secrets also believes that one should pray God in His mercy to avert future evils and ordain otherwise, “For He has not so ordained things that to ordain otherwise derogates in any respect from His Providence.” But this is not so approved astrological doctrine. Later in the work Alexander is once more urged never to take medicine or open a vein except with the approval of his astronomers,[859] and directions are given as to the constellations under which bleeding should be performed and also concerning the taking of laxatives with reference to the position of the moon in the signs of the zodiac.[860] Later the work discusses the relations of the four elements and of various herbs to the seven planets,[861] and in the next to last chapter Alexander is advised to conduct his wars under the guidance of astrology.[862]

[Sidenote: Story of the two boys.]

There is much indulging in astrological theory in the midst of the chapter on Justice, and the constitution of the universe is set forth from the first and highest simple spiritual substance down through the nine heavens and spheres to the lowest inferiors. To illustrate the power of the stars the story is presently told of two boys,[863] one a weaver’s son, the other a royal prince of India. Sages who were chance guests in the weaver’s house at the time of the child’s birth noted that his horoscope was that of a courtier high in royal councils but kept their discovery to themselves. The boy’s parents vainly tried to make a weaver of him, but even beatings were in vain; he was finally allowed to follow his natural inclination, secured an education, and became in time a royal governor. The king’s son, on the contrary, despite his royal birth and the fact that his father sent him through all his provinces to learn the sciences, would take no interest in anything except mechanics conformably to his horoscope.

[Sidenote: Virtues of stones and herbs, incantations and amulets.]

In The Secret of Secrets the Pseudo-Aristotle refers Alexander for the virtues of gems and herbs to his treatises on stones and plants, presumably those which we have already described. He does not entirely refrain from discussion of such marvelous properties in the present work, however, mentioning the use of the virtues of stones in connection with incantations. We also again hear of stones which will prevent any army from withstanding Alexander or which will cause horses to whinny or keep them from doing so; and of herbs which bring true or false dreams or cause joy, love, hate, honor, reverence, courage, and inertia.[864] One recipe reads, “If you take in the name of someone seven grains of the seeds of the herb called androsimon, and hold them in his name when Lucifer and Venus are rising so that their rays touch him (or them?), and if you give him those seven grains to eat or pulverized in drink, fear of you will ever abide in his heart and he will obey you for the rest of his life.”[865] The discussion of incantations, astrological images, and amulets is omitted from many Latin manuscripts but occurs in Roger Bacon’s version.[866]

[Sidenote: Thirteenth century scepticism.]

The extreme powers attributed to herbs and stones in The Secret of Secrets aroused some scepticism among its Latin readers of the thirteenth century.[867] Geoffrey of Waterford, a Dominican from Ireland who died about 1300, translated The Secret of Secrets into French. He criticized, however, its assertions concerning the virtues of stones and herbs as more akin to fables than to philosophy, a fact of which, he adds, all clerks who know Latin well are aware. He wonders why Alexander had to win his battles by hard fighting when Aristotle is supposed to inform him in this book of a stone which will always rout the enemy. Geoffrey decides that such false statements are the work of the translators and that Aristotle is the author only of what is well said or reasonable in the work.

[Sidenote: Number and alchemy.]

Something is said in The Secret of Secrets of the occult properties and relative perfection of numbers, and as usual the preference is for the numbers, three, four, seven, and ten.[868] The Hebrew version adds a puerile method of divining who will be victor in a battle by a numerical calculation based upon the letters in the names of the generals. The Latin versions of the thirteenth century contain a chapter on alchemy which had great influence and gives a recipe for the philosopher’s stone and the Emerald Table of Hermes.[869] But in the Hebrew version and Achillini’s printed text occurs a passage in which Alexander is warned that alchemy is not a true science.[870]

[Sidenote: The poisonous maiden.]

We may conclude our picture of the work’s contents with two of its stories, namely, concerning the poisonous maiden and the Jew and the Magus. A beautiful maiden was sent from India to Alexander with other rich gifts. But she had been fed upon poison from infancy “until she was of the nature of a snake. And had I not perceived it,” continues Aristotle in the Hebrew version, “for I suspected the clever men of those countries and their craft, and had I not found by tests that she would kill thee by her embrace and by her perspiration, she surely would have killed thee.”[871] This venomous maiden is also alluded to in various medieval discussions of poisons. Peter of Abano mentions her in his De venenis.[872] Gilbert of England, following no doubt Gerard of Cremona’s translation of Avicenna, cites Ruffus rather than the Pseudo-Aristotle concerning her and says nothing of her relations with Alexander, but adds that animals who approached her spittle were killed by it.[873] In Le Secret aux philosophes, a French work of the closing thirteenth century, where the story is told at considerable length, Socrates rather than Aristotle saves Alexander from the poisonous maid.[874]

[Sidenote: The Jew and the Magus.]

In the other story a Magus is represented in a much more favorable light than magicians generally were; he seems to represent rather one of the Persian sages. He was traveling on a mule with provisions and met a Jew traveling on foot. Their talk soon turned to their respective religions and moral standards. The Magus professed altruism; the Jew was inclined to get the better of all men except Jews. When these principles had been stated, the Jew requested the Magus, since he professed to observe the law of love, to dismount and let him ride the mule. No sooner had this been done than the Jew, true to his law of selfishness and hate, made off with both mule and provisions. This misfortune did not lead the Magus to lose his faith in God, however, and as he plodded along he by and by came again upon the Jew who had fallen off the mule and broken his neck. The Magus then mercifully brought the Jew to the nearest town where he died, while the king of the country made the Magus one of his trusted ministers of state.[875]

FOOTNOTES:

[755] See Roger Bacon’s allusion to this passage in F. A. Gasquet, “An Unpublished Fragment of a Work by Roger Bacon,” in EHR, XII (1897), p. 502.

[756] Ch. Gidel, La Légende d’Aristote au moyen âge, in Assoc. des Études Grecques, (1874), pp. 285-332, except for the Pseudo-Callisthenes uses only the French vernacular literature or popular legends concerning Aristotle. Similar in scope is W. Hertz, Aristoteles in den Alexanderdichtungen des Mittelalters, in Abhandl. d. philos-philol. Classe d. k. bayr. Akad. d. Wiss., XIX (1892) 1-103; revised in W. Hertz, Gesammelte Abhandlungen, 1905, 1-155.

[757] De naturis rerum, II, 189.

[758] Compendium Studii Philosophiae, ed. Brewer, (1859), p. 473.

[759] It was translated into Arabic about 840 A. D.; an interpolated Latin paraphrase of it was published at Rome in 1519, by Pietro Niccolo de’ Castellani,--Sapientissimi Aristotelis Stagiritae Theologia sive mistica philosophia, secundum Aegyptios noviter reperta et in latinam castigatissime redacta; a French version appeared at Paris in 1572 (Carra de Vaux, Avicenne, p. 74). F. Dieterici translated it from Arabic into German in 1883, after publishing the Arabic text for the first time in 1882. For divergences between this Arabic text and the Latin one of 1519, and citation of Baumgartner that the Theology was known in Latin translation as early as 1200, see Grabmann (1916), pp. 245-7.

[760] Indeed Carra de Vaux, Avicenne, p. 73, says, “Tout un livre qui ne contient en réalité que des extraits des Ennéades IV à VI de Plotin.”

[761] See Arundel MS 165, 14th century. On the general subject of the Pseudo-Aristotelian literature the reader may consult V. Rose, Aristoteles Pseudepigraphus, and De ordine et auctoritate librorum Aristotelis; Munk’s article “Aristote” in La France littéraire; Schwab, Bibliographie d’Aristote, Paris, 1896; and R. Shute, History of the Aristotelian Writings, Oxford, 1888. It is, however, a difficult subject and for the middle ages at least has not been satisfactorily investigated. Grabmann (1916) devotes only a page or two of supplement to it; see pp. 248-51. A work on Aristotle in the middle ages, announced in 1904 by G. H. Luquet, seems not to have appeared.

[762] Sloane 2030, fols. 110-13.

[763] Hammer-Jensen, Das sogenannte IV Buch der Meteorologie des Aristoteles, in Hermes, vol. 50 (1915) pp. 113-36, argues that its teachings differ from those of Aristotle and assigns it to Strato, his younger contemporary. Not content with this thesis, which is easier to suggest than to prove, Hammer-Jensen contends that it was a work of Strato’s youth and that it profoundly influenced Aristotle himself in his last works. “The convenient Strato!” as he is called by Loveday and Forster in the preface to their translation of De coloribus (1913) vol. VI of The Works of Aristotle translated into English under the editorship of W. D. Ross.

[764] So Hammer-Jensen, p. 113, and earlier Heller (1882), I, 61.

[765] Nürnberg Stadtbibliothek (centur. V, 59, membr. 13th century)--cited by Rose, Hermes 1, 385,--“Completus est liber metheororum cuius tres primos libros transtulit magister Gerardus Lumbardus summus philosophus de arabico in latinum. Quartum autem transtulit Henricus Aristippus de greco in latinum. Tria ultima capitula transtulit Aluredus Anglicus sarelensis de arabico in latinum.”

Steinschneider (1893) pp. 59 and 84; (1905) p. 7; and others, including Hammer-Jensen, give the name of the translator of the fourth book from the Greek as Hermann and of the last three chapters as Aurelius, whom Steinschneider is more correct in describing as “otherwise unknown.” On the other hand, we know that Aristippus and Alfred translated other Aristotelian treatises. Evidently Steinschneider and the others have followed MSS where the copyist has corrupted the proper names.

[766] Steinschneider and Hammer-Jensen quote from MSS, “tria vero ultima Avicennae capitula transtulit Aurelius de arabico in latinum.” Albertus Magnus, Mineral, III, i, 9, also ascribed the passage to Avicenna; others have suggested that it is by disciples of Avicenna. See J. Wood Brown (1897) pp. 72-3, for a similar passage from Avicenna’s Sermo de generatione lapidum.

[767] They were printed at Bologna, 1501, as Liber de mineralibus Aristotelis and also published, sometimes as Geber’s, sometimes as Avicenna’s, under the title, Liber de congelatione.

BN 16142 contains a Latin translation of the four books of the Meteorology with an addition dealing with minerals and geology which is briefer than the printed Liber de mineralibus Aristotelis, omitting the passage against the alchemists: published by F. de Mély, Rev. des Études grecques, (1894), p. 185 et seq. (cited Hammer-Jensen, 131).

[768] Speculum naturale, VIII, 85.

[769] See note 1 above.

[770] Greek text by Prantl, Teubner, 1881; English translation by Loveday and Forster, 1913. See also Prantl, Aristoteles über die Farben, 1849.

[771] Just a few examples are: Mazarine 3458 and 3459, 13th century; 3460 and 3461, 14th century; Arsenal 748A, 15th century, fol. 185; BN 6325, 14th century, #1; BN 14719, 14-15th century, fol. 38-; BN 14717, end 13th century; BN 16633, 13th century, fol. 102-; S. Marco X, 57, 13th century, beautifully illuminated, fols. 312-17; Assisi 283, 14th century, fol. 289-; Volterra 19, 14th century, fol. 196-.

[772] Berthelot (1885) p. 143, “Platon et Aristote sont mis en tête de la liste des alchimistes œcuméniques sans qu’aucun ouvrage leur soit assigné.”

[773] Berthelot (1888) I, 76; citing Manget, Bibl. Chemica, I, 622.

[774] Digby 162, 13th century, fols. 10v-11v, “Incipit liber Aristotelis de aquis secreti fluminis translatus ab arabico in latinum.” In the margin the twelve waters are briefly designated: 1 rubicunda, 2 penetrativa, 3 mollificativa, et ingrediente, 4 de aqua eiusdem ponderis et magnitudinis, 5 ignita, 6 sulphurea, 7 aqua cineris, 8 aurea, etc. In one or two cases, however, these heads do not quite apply to the corresponding chapters.

[775] Ashmole 1448, 15th century, pp. 200-202, de “altitudinibus, profundis, lateribusque” metallorum secundum Aristotelem (name in the margin). It opens, “Plumbum est in altitudine sua ar. nigrum.” It takes up in turn the altitudo of each metal and then discusses the next quality in the same way.

Ibid., pp. 239-44, opens, “Arestotilus, Cum studii, etc. Scias preterea quod propter longitudines”; at p. 241 it treats “de purificatione solis et lune” (i.e., gold and silver); at p. 243, “de separatione solis et lune.” It ends with a paragraph about the composition of a golden seal.

[776] CLM 12026, 15th century, fol. 46-, “Alchymia est ars docens ... / ... Explicit dicto libri (sic) Aristotelis de theorica in rebus naturalibus”; fol. 78, Liber Aristotelis de practica summae philosophiae, “Primo de separatione salis communis....”

CLM 25110, 15th century, fols. 211-45, Liber Aristotelis de 70 preceptis.

CLM 25113, 16th century, fols. 10-28, A. de alchimia liber qui dicitur de 70 preceptis.

[777] Egerton 1984, fol. 141v; in the De natura rerum.

[778] See Chapter 51 on Michael Scot, near the close.

[779] Caps. 22 and 57. It was printed with further “Additions” of its own in 1561 in Verae alchemiae artisque metallicae citra aenigmata, Basel, 1561, II, 188-225.

[780] Thus in Auriferae artis quam chemiam vocant antiquissimi authores, Basel, 1572, pp. 387-99, a treatise which cites Morienus, Rasis, and Avicenna is printed as Tractatulus Aristotelis de Practica lapidis philosophici. Apparently the only reason for ascribing it to Aristotle is that it cites “the philosopher” in its opening sentence, “Cum omne corpus secundum philosophum aut est elementum aut ab elementis generatum.”

[781] Laud. Misc. 708, 15th century, fol. 54.

[782] Berthelot (1893), I, 105 and 107.

[783] Ashmole 1448, 15th century, p. 123.

[784] Ashmole 1450, 15th century, fol. 8, “Epistola ad Alexandrum. O Alexander rector hominum ... / ... et audientes non intelligant.”

Harleian 3703, 14th century, fols. 41r-42r, Aristoteles ad alexandrum. “In primo o elaxandor tradere tibi volo secretorum maximum secretum ...,” is a similar treatise.

[785] Ashmole 1384, mid 14th century, fols. 91v-93r, “Incipit Epistola Alexandri. Dicunt philosophi quod ars dirivata sit ex creatione hominis cui omnia insunt ... / ... ex omni specie et colore nomine. Explicit epistola Alexandri.” In the text itself, which is written in the manner of a master to a disciple, there is nothing to show that the work is by Alexander rather than Aristotle.

The following is apparently the same treatise but the closing words are different.

Riccard. 1165, 15th century, fols. 161-3, Liber Alexandri in scientia secretorum nature. “Dicitur quod hec ars derivata sit ex creacione hominis cui omnia insunt ... / ... et deo annuente ad optatum finem pervenies.”

The next would seem to be another treatise than the foregoing.

Arezzo 232, 15th century, fols. 1-14, “Liber transmissus ab Alexandro rege ex libro Hermogenis.”

Hermogenes, who is cited on the subject of the philosopher’s stone in at least one MS of the Secret of Secrets (Bodleian 67, fol. 33v, “Et pater noster Hermogenes qui triplex est in philosophia optime philosophando dixit”), is apparently none other than Hermes Trismegistus. He is also mentioned in a brief work of Aristotle to Alexander; Harleian 3703, 14th century, fols. 41r-42r, “... hermogenes quod (sic) egypti multum commendunt et laudant et sibi attribuant omnem scientiam secretam et celerem (?).” The use of the reflexive pronoun in this sentence to refer to Hermogenes I would have the reader note, as it appears to illustrate a fairly common medieval usage which has or will lead me to alter the translations which have been proposed for certain other passages.

[786] II, 9.

[787] Excursions historiques, etc., p. 562.

[788] I have read it in an incunabulum edition numbered IA.49867 in the British Museum.

[789] Ibid., fols. 21v-22r, “Nos Manfredus divi augusti imperatoris frederici filius dei gratia princeps tharentinus honoris montis sancti angeli dominus et illustris regis conradi servi in regno sicilie baiulus ... quem librum cum non inveniretur inter cristianos, quoniam eum in ebrayco legimus translatum de arabico in hebreum, sanitate rehabita ad eruditionem multorum et de hebrea lingua transtulimus in latinam in quo a compilatore quedam recitabilia inseruntur. Nam dictum librum aristotiles non notavit sed notatus ab aliis extitit qui causam hylaritatis sue mortis discere voluerunt sicut in libri serie continetur.”

[790] Edition No. IA.49867 in the British Museum, fols. 25v-26r.

[791] Cap. 4.

[792] Verbum 4.

[793] De causis et proprietatibus elementorum, IX, 585-653 in Borgnet’s edition of Albert’s works; Albert himself in his treatise on Minerals cites the title as “Liber de causis proprietatum elementorum et planetarum.”

[794] Cotton Appendix VI, fol. 8r, “liber iste est aristotelis in scientia ipsius astronomie.”

[795] Fol. 11v, “Alius liber de nativitatibus”; opens, “Superius prout potuimus promissorum partem explevimus.”

[796] Fol. 13r, “De electionibus alius liber”; opens, “Unde constellationibus egyptios imitantes nativitates satis dilucide dixerimus.” This book intermingles the subjects of interrogations and elections, and ends at fol. 20v, “Finit liber de interrogationibus.”

[797] BN 16208, fol. 76r-, “liber arystotelis milesii medici perypathetici in principiis iudiciorum astronomorum in interrogationibus.”

[798] Cotton Appendix VI, fol. 20v, “Incipit commentum super praemissa scilicet praedictum librum”; fol. 23v, “Expositio ad litteram superioris tractatus. Ptolomaeus summus philosophus et excellentissimus egyptiorum rex....”

[799] Grenoble 814, fols. 1-24. “Cy commence le livre de jugemens d’astrologie selon Aristote. Le prologue du derrenier translateur. Aristote fist un livre de jugemens....”

[800] CLM 25010, 15-16th century, fols. 1-12, “liber de iudiciis qui ab Alberto in Speculo suo dicitur esse Aristotelis.”

[801] Amplon. Quarto 377, 14th century, fols. 25-36, de iudiciis astrorum. Schum identifies it with the work ascribed to Aristotle by Albert in the Speculum astronomiae.

[802] Bridges (1897), I, 389-90; Brewer (1859) p. 473.

[803] Digby 159, 14th century, fols. 1-87, mutilated at the end. “Liber Aristotilis de ducentis lvque Indorum voluminibus, universalium questionum tam genecialium quam circularium summam continens.” At fol. 5v, “Explicit prologus. Incipit Aristotelis commentum in astrologiam.” This is the MS which I have chiefly followed.

Savile Latin 15 (Bernard 6561), 15th century, fols. 185-204v, is similar.

[804] In the text the number is given as ccl; see Digby 159, fol. 2r.

[805] Digby 159, fol. 2r.

[806] Savile 15, fol. 205r.

[807] Bodleian 67 (Bernard 2136), 14th century, fol. 54r, De ydeis et formis; fol. 54v, De impressione formarum; fol. 56v, De ymaginibus et annulis. These chapters are sometimes included in the Secret of Secrets, as in Roger Bacon’s version; Steele (1920) 157-63. But “in the greater part of the Latin MSS this section is entirely omitted”; Ibid., lxii. Steele does not mention Bodleian 67.

[808] Brewer (1859) p. 532, De secretis, cap. 3.

[809] BN 2598, fol. 101r, “liber quem Aristoteles attribuit Alexandro et quem nonnulli mortis intitulent anime.”

[810] See above, I, 713-714.

[811] Ashmole 369, late 13th century, fols. 77-84v, “Mathematica Alexandri summi astrologi. In exordio omnis creature herus huranicus inter cuncta sidera xii maluit signa fore / nam quod lineam designat eandem stellam occupat. Explicit.” Cap. x, de inveniendo de prospero aut adverso itinere; xi, de copia et paupertate; xiv, de nece aut casu amici; xvi, de latrocinio inveniendo; xxiv, de pecunia in terra defossa; xxxviii, de noscendis maleficiis.

[812] In the preface to the Kiranides; in Montpellier 277, 15th century; and in Ashmole 1448, 15th century, pp. 44-45, “Virtutes 7 herbarum a septem planetis secundum Alexandrum Imperatorem.” It is also embodied in some editions and MSS of the Liber aggregationis or Experimenta attributed to Albertus Magnus (see Chapter 63), where it is entitled, “Virtutes herbarum septem secundum Alexandrum Imperatorem.”

[813] Ashmole 1741, late 14th century, fol. 143, “Incipiunt virtutes septem herbarum Aristotilis. Et has quidem virtutes habent ipse septem herbe ab influentia 7 planetarum. Nam contingit unamquamque recipere virtutem suam a superioribus naturaliter. Nam dicit Aristotiles quod corpora inferiora reguntur per superiora.”

[814] Sloane 3854, 15th century, fols. 105 V-110.

[815] L. Blochet, Études sur le Gnosticisme musulman, in Rivista degli studi orientali, IV, 76.

[816] De universo, II, ii, 39 and 98; II, iii, 6. I presume that there is some connection between our present treatise and those on the seven planets, Venus, and the moon mentioned in our chapter on the Hermetic books.

[817] One MS is Harleian 3487, 14th century, #11.

[818] V. Rose, Aristoteles de lapidibus und Arnoldus Saxo, in Zeitschrift für deutsches Alterthum, XVIII (1875) 321 et seq. More recently the Lapidary of Aristotle has been edited by J. Ruska, Das Steinbuch des Aristoteles ... nach der arabischen Handschrift, Heidelberg, 1912, who gives both the Latin of the Liège MS and the text of the translation into Arabic by Luca ben Serapion from BN 2772, with a German translation of it.

[819] Ruska (1912), p. 43.

[820] Ibid., p. 183, “Et ego transfero ipsum ex greco sermone in ydyoma su(r)orum vel Syrorum.”

[821] Liège 77, 14th century; printed by Rose (1875) pp. 349-82.

Montpellier 277, 15th century, fol. 127-; printed by Rose (1875) pp. 384-97.

The following treatises, also ascribed to Aristotle, I have not examined: Sloane 2459, 15th century, fols. 9v-16, de proprietatibus herbarum et lapidum; Vienna 2301, 15th century, fols. 81-2, “Isti sunt lapides quorum virtutes misit Aristotiles in scriptis maximo imperatori Alexandro.” Perhaps the last may have reference to philosopher’s stones, like the similar treatise of Aristotle to Alexander noted above in our discussion of the pseudo-Aristotelian alchemical treatises.

[822] See above chapter 21, I, 496.

[823] De causis elementorum, etc., II, ii. 1 (Borgnet, IX 643).

[824] HL XXV, 65.

[825] De venenis, cap. 5, probably written in 1316, but see chapter 70, appendix vi.

[826] Aristotle, Lapidarius et Liber de physionomia, Merseburg, 1473, p. 8.

[827] De naturis rerum, II, 21. In an illustrated 13th century MS of the vernacular Romance of Alexander three pictures are devoted to his submarine. CU Trinity 1446, 1250 A. D., fol. 27r, “Coment Alisandre vesqui suz les ewes; a covered ship with windows under green water, Alexander and three men in it; fol. 27v, Des nefs ke sont apelees colifas; a similar ship in the water, no one visible in it; Coment Alisandre encercha la nature de pessons; Alexander and two men in the ship, fish and mermaid below.” I have quoted James’ description of the MS (III, 488).

See also Lacroix, Science and Literature in the Middle Ages, 1878, Fig. 87, p. 119, for Alexander descending to the bottom of the sea in a glass cask, from a thirteenth century MS, Brussels 11040.

[828] See chapter 61, pp. 654-5.

[829] Budge, Egyptian Magic, 1899, pp. 152-6; Masʿudi, Les Prairies d’Or. ed. B. de Maynard and Pavet de Courteille, 1861, II, 425ff.

[830] Budge (1899), pp. 95-6.

[831] CLM 2574b, bombyc. 13th century, fol. 69v. Although Steele (1920) p. lviii, says, “No Latin manuscript is known in which there is a figure of the horn, with the exception of that in Holkam Hall, in the borders of which an entirely fanciful instrument is depicted (reproduced in plate 151 of the Roxburghe Club publication of 1914). There are drawings in MSS C and D of the Eastern Arabic text, of entirely different shape.”

[832] Steele (1920), p. 151.

[833] Cap. 5.

[834] Very similar is the story in the Gilgamesh epic, a work “far more ancient than Genesis,” of a serpent stealing a life-giving plant from Gilgamesh while he was bathing in a well or brook. The plant, which had been revealed to Gilgamesh by the deified Utnapishtim, “had the miraculous power of renewing youth and bore the name, ‘the old man becomes young.’” Sir James Frazer (1918), I, 50-51, follows Rabbi Julian Morgenstern (“On Gilgamesh Epic, XI, 274-320,” in Zeitschrift f. Assyriologie, XXIX, 1915, p. 284ff.) in connecting this incident with the serpent and the tree of life in the Biblical account of the fall of man, and gives further examples from primitive folk-lore of other jealous animals, such as the dog, frog, duck, and lizard, perverting divine gifts or good tidings to man to their own profit.

[835] Sloane 2030, fols. 125-26; Additional 15236, fols. 154-60; BN, 7420A (14th century) #16.

[836] Richard Förster, De Aristotelis quae feruntur physiognomonicis recensendis, Kiliae, 1882; De translat. latin. physiognom., Kiliae, 1884; Scriptores Physiognomici, Lipsiae, 1893-1894.

[837] Cotton Julius D-viii, fol. 126ff.; Harleian 3969; Egerton 847; Sloane 2030, fol. 95-103; Additional 15236, fol. 160 (in abbreviated form); Sloane 3281, fols. 19-23; Sloane 3584; Egerton 2852, fol. 115v, et seq.

[838] There is a manuscript copy of a commentary on it of the fourteenth century at Erfurt, Amplon. Quarto 186. See Schum’s catalogue for MSS of the Physiognomia itself in the Amplonian collection.

[839] R. Förster, De Aristotelis quae feruntur secreta secretorum Commentatio, Kiliae, 1888; Handschriften und Ausgaben des pseudo-aristotelischen Secretum secretorum, in Centralblatt f. Bibliothekwesen, VI (1889), 1-22, 57-76. And see Steele (1920).

[840] M. Gaster, in his “Introduction to a Hebrew version of the Secret of Secrets,” in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1908, part 2), pp. 1065-84; for the Hebrew text and an English translation, Ibid. (1907), pp. 879-913 and (1908, part 1), pp. 111-62.

[841] Ed. Robert Steele, EETS, LXVI, London, 1894. Volume LXXIV contains three earlier English versions. There are numerous MSS of it in Italian in the Riccardian and Palatini collections at Florence.

[842] De Somno et vigilia, I, ii, 7.

[843] Tanner 116, 13th century; Corpus Christi 149, 15th century. Recently edited by Robert Steele, 1920, as Fasc. V of his Opera hactenus inedita Rogeri Baconi.

[844] There are considerable discrepancies between the different early printed editions, which differ in length, order of arrangement, tables of contents, and number of chapters. And in the same edition the chapter headings given in the course of the text may not agree with those in the table of contents, which as a rule, even in the MSS, does not fully cover the subject-matter of the text. The different printers have probably used different manuscripts for their editions rather than made any new additions of their own. The following editions are those to which references will be made in the following pages.

An edition printed at Cologne about 1480, which I examined at the Harvard University Library, divides the text into only thirty chapters and seems imperfect.

An edition of about 1485, which I examined at the British Museum, where it was numbered IA.10756, has 74 chapters, and the headings of its 25th and 30th chapters, for instance, agree with those of the 11th and 13th chapters in the Harvard copy.

A third edition of Paris, 1520, has no numbered chapters and contains passages not found in the two earlier editions.

As a check upon these printed texts I have examined the three following MSS, two of the 13th, and one of the 14th, century. Of these Egerton 2676 corresponds fairly closely throughout to the edition numbered IA.10756 in the British Museum.

Egerton 2676, 13th century, fols. 3-52.

BN 6584, 13th century, fols. 1r-32v.

Bodleian 67, 14th century, fols. 1-53v, is much like the preceding MS.

[845] BN 6584, fol. 1v, “De prologo cuiusdam doctoris in commendatione aristotelis.” See also Digby 228, 14th century, fol. 27, where a scribe has written in the upper margin, “In isto libello primo ponitur prologus, deinde tabula contentorum in libro, deinde prologus cuiusdam doctoris in commendacionem Aristotilis, deinde prologus Iohannis qui transtulit librum istum....” In Egerton 2676, fol. 6r, “Deus omnipotens custodiat regem....”

[846] Steele (1920), p. xi.

[847] Steinschneider (1905), p. 42, it is true, says, “Ob Joh. selbst das ganze Secretum übersetzt habe, ist noch nicht ermittelt”; but the following passage, cited by Giacosa (1901), p. 386, from Bibl. Angelica Rome, Cod. 1481, 12th century, fols. 144-146v, indicates that he translated only the medical part.

“Cum de utilitate corporis olim tractarim et a me quasi essem medicus vestra nobilitas quereret ut brevem libellum et de observatione diete et de continentia cordis in qualibus se debent contineri qui sanitatem corporis cupiunt servare accidit ut dum cogitarem vestre iussioni obedire huius rei exempliar aristotelis philosophi Alexandro dictum repente in mente occurreret quod excerpi de libro qui arabice vocatur ciralacerar id est secretum secretorum que fecit fieri predictus Aristotelis philosophus Alexandro regi magno de dispositione regni in quo continentur multa regibus utilia....”

Steele (1920) pp. xvii-xviii, gives the same passage, worded and spelled a little differently, from another MS, Addit. 26770.

[848] Ed. H. Souchier, Denkmäler provenzal. Lit. u. Sprache, Halle, 1883, I, 473 et seq.

[849] Thirteenth century MSS of Philip’s translation are numerous: I have not noted a 12th century one.

[850] See above, chapter 47, p. 244.

[851] Brown (1897), pp. 19-20, 36-7. But not much reliance can be placed on the inclusion of this name, “Master Philip of Tripoli,” in a title which Brown (p. 20) quotes from a De Rossi MS, “The Book of the Inspections of Urine according to the opinion of the Masters, Peter of Berenico, Constantine Damascenus, and Julius of Salerno; which was composed by command of the Emperor Frederick, Anno Domini 1212, in the month of February, and was revised by Master Philip of Tripoli and Master Gerard of Cremona at the orders of the King of Spain,” etc., since Gerard of Cremona at least had died in 1187 and there was no “king of Spain” until 1479. Brown does not give the Latin for the passage, but if the date 1212 could be regarded as Spanish era and turned into 1174 A. D., Gerard of Cremona would still be living, the emperor would be Frederick Barbarossa instead of Frederick II, and Master Philip of Tripoli might be the same Philip whom Pope Alexander III proposed to send to Prester John in 1177.

Steele (1920) p. xix, inclines to identify Philip of Tripoli with a canon of Byblos from 1243 to 1248, but that seems to me too late a date for his translation of The Secret of Secrets.

[852] BN 6584, fol. 1r, “Hunc librum quo carebant latini eo quod apud paucissimos arabies reperitur transtuli cum magno labore....” A considerable portion of Philip’s preface is omitted in the Harvard edition.

[853] The preliminary table of contents, however, gives only chapter headings, which in BN 6584 are 82 in number, but the beginnings of the ten books are indicated in the text in BN 6584 as follows. The numbers in parentheses are the corresponding leaves in Bodleian 67 which, however, omits mention of the book and its number except in the case of the fourth book.

Fol. 3v (5r), Incipit liber primus. Epistola ad Alexandrum.

Fol. 6r, Secundus liber de dispositione Regali et reverentia Regis.

Fol. 12r (18v), Incipit liber tertius. Cum hoc corpus corruptibile sit eique accidit corruptio....

Fol. 22r (36r), Incipit liber quartus. transtulit magister philippus tripolitanus de forma iusticie.

Fol. 28r (44v), Liber Quintus de scribis et scriptoribus secretorum.

Fol. 28r (45r), Liber Sextus de nuntiis et informationibus ipsorum.

Fol. 28v (46v), Liber Septimus de hiis qui sr’ intendunt et habent curam subditorum.

Fol. 29r (47r), Liber Octavus de dispositione ductoris sui et de electione bellatorum et procerum inferiores (?).

Fol. 29v (48r), Liber Nonus de regimine bellatorum et forma aggrediendi bellum et pronatationibus eorundem.

Fol. 30v (50v), Sermo de phisionomia cuiuslibet hominis.

[854] It is omitted in some printed editions, but occurs in both 13th century MSS which I examined.

[855] Gaster (1908), p. 1076.

[856] Steinschneider (1905), p. 60.

[857] Cap. 11 (Harvard copy); cap. 25 (BM IA.10756); Egerton 2676, fol. 12r; BN 6584, fol. 9v; Steele (1920) pp. 58-59.

[858] Cap. 13 (Harvard copy); cap. 30 (BM IA.10756); Egerton 2676, fol. 13r; BN 6584, fol. 10r; Steele (1920) p. 60; also in Gaster’s Hebrew text.

[859] Egerton 2676, fol. 32r; cap. 62 (BM IA.10756); fol. 33r (Paris, 1520); BN 6584, fol. 19v; Steele (1920) pp. 108-10.

[860] The Paris, 1520, edition then goes on to explain the effects of incantations and images upon astrological grounds, but this passage seems to be missing from the earlier printed editions and the thirteenth century manuscripts. Roger Bacon, however, implies that incantations were present in Philip’s original translation, and one Arabic MS gives cabalistic signs for the planets; Steele (1920) pp. 258-9.

[861] This passage is found both in Egerton MS 2676 and in BM IA.10756. BN 6584, fol. 21r-v. Bodl. 67, fol. 32v-35v. Steele, 119-20.

[862] Cap. 73 (BM IA.10756); fols. 44v-45r (Paris, 1520); BN 6584, fol. 30v; Steele, 155-6.

[863] BN 6584, fol. 21r; also in Gaster’s Hebrew version; cap. 26 in the Harvard copy; Steele, 137.

[864] Gaster, pp. 116, 160-62; Egerton 2676, fols. 34r-35r; cap. 66 (BM IA.10756); fol. 37v (Paris, 1520); BN 6584, fol. 20r-22r; Steele, 121-2.

[865] Egerton 2676, fol. 36v; BN 6584, fol. 22r; Steele, 122.

[866] Steele (1920) pp. lxii, 157-63, 252-61; Paris (1520), fol. 37; Gaster, p. 159.

[867] HL XXI, 216ff.

[868] Caps. 68 and 72 (BM IA.10756); cap. 68 appears in Egerton 2676; cap. 72 in Gaster’s text and in the Paris (1520) edition. I could not find the passage in BN 6584; Steele (1920) 134-5.

[869] BN 6584, fol. 20r-v; Egerton 2676, fols. 33v-34r; cap. 65 (BM IA.10756); fols. 36v-37r (Paris 1520); Steele, 114-15.

[870] Gaster, 159-60; fol. 38r (Paris, 1520); Steele, 174.

[871] Gaster, p. 127; cap. 12 (Harvard copy); also in BM IA.10756, and BN 6584, fol. 10r, where Aristotle seems to detect the venomous nature of the maiden by magic art--“Et nisi ego illa hora sagaciter inspexissem in ipsam et arte magica iudicassem....”; while it is her mere bite that kills men, as Alexander afterwards proved experimentally; Steele, 60.

[872] Cap. 3.

[873] Gilbertus Anglicus, Compendium medicinae, Lyons, 1510, fol. 348v.

[874] HL XXX, 569ff. “Die Sage vom Giftmädchen” is the theme of a long monograph by W. Hertz, Gesammelte Abhandlungen (1905), pp. 156-277.

[875] BN 6584, fol. 27; IA.10756, cap. 68; also in Paris, 1520 edition, etc.; Steele, 144-6.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

XLIX. SOLOMON AND THE ARS NOTORIA

Solomon as a magician--Magic books ascribed to Solomon--Manuscripts of them--Notory art of Solomon and Apollonius--Other works ascribed to Solomon and Apollonius--Liber sacratus; preface--Incipit and Explicit--A work of theurgy or the notory art--Character of its contents--The third “work”--The fourth and fifth “works”--How to operate with spirits--The seal of the living God--Spirits of Saturn.

[Sidenote: Solomon as a magician.]

It was only natural that Solomon, regarded as the wisest man in the history of the world, should be represented in oriental tradition as the worker of many marvels and that in the course of time books of magic should be attributed to him, just as treatises on the interpretation of dreams were ascribed to Joseph and Daniel. Roger Bacon speaks of the magic books in a grand-sounding style which were falsely ascribed to Solomon and which “ought all to be prohibited by law.”[876] Solomon’s reputation as a magician, even in the western Latin-speaking world, was much older than the thirteenth century, however. In 1918 Roman archaeologists excavated at Ostia a bronze disc, on one side of which was depicted Solomon as a magician, stirring with a long ladle some mess in a large cauldron. On the other side of the disc was a figure of the triple Hecate, who, like Solomon, was surrounded by mystic signs and magic characters.[877]

[Sidenote: Magic books ascribed to Solomon.]

But to return to the medieval period. In the first half of the thirteenth century William of Auvergne, bishop of Paris, in his treatise on laws declares that there is no divinity in the angles of Solomon’s pentagon, that the rings of Solomon and the seals of Solomon and the nine candles (candariae) are a form of idolatry, and involve execrable consecrations and detestable invocations and images. “As for that horrible image called the Idea Salomonis et entocta, let it never be mentioned among Christians.” In the same class are the book called Sacratus and the figure Mandel or Amandel.[878] Some years later Albertus Magnus, listing evil books of necromantic images in his Speculum astronomiae,[879] includes five treatises current under the name of Solomon, and seems to have in mind about the same works as William. One is De figura Almandel, another De novem candariis, and a third on the four rings (De quatuor annulis) opens with the words “De arte eutonica et ideica,” which remind one of William’s “Idea Salomonis et entocta,” and is perhaps also identical with a Liber de umbris idearum cited under the name of Solomon by Cecco d’Ascoli in his necromantic commentary upon the Sphere of Sacrobosco,[880] written in the early fourteenth century.

[Sidenote: Manuscripts of them.]

Moreover, these same works are apparently still extant in manuscripts in European libraries. The figure Almandal or Almandel and the rings of Solomon are found in fifteenth century manuscripts at Florence and Paris,[881] while in the Sloane collection of the British Museum we find Solomon’s pentagon, the divine seal, the four rings, and the nine candles, all in seventeenth century manuscripts.[882] In these seventeenth century manuscripts also appear, and more than once, the Clavicula or Key of Solomon, in French, Italian, and English,[883] the book by Solomon called Cephar or Saphar Raziel,[884] and the Liber sacer or sacratus.[885] The last-named work, mentioned at least twice in the thirteenth century by William of Auvergne, who calls it “a cursed and execrable book,”[886] is also found in manuscripts of the fourteenth or fifteenth century,[887] and we shall presently consider it in particular as a specimen of the Pseudo-Solomon literature and of medieval books of magic, theurgy, and necromancy.

[Sidenote: Notory art of Solomon and Apollonius.]

Let us first, however, note some other works ascribed to Solomon and which have to do with the Ars Notoria, or Notory Art, which seeks to gain knowledge from or communion with God by invocation of angels, mystic figures, and magical prayers. We are told that the Creator revealed this art through an angel to Solomon one night while he was praying, and that by it one can in a short time acquire all the liberal and mechanical arts.[888] There seems to be little difference between the notory art of Solomon, that of Solomon, Machineus, and Euclid,[889] and the Golden Flowers of Apollonius,[890] in which Solomon is mentioned almost every other sentence. Cecco d’Ascoli may have had it in mind when he cited the Book of Magic Art of Apollonius and the Angelic Faction of the same author.[891] In one manuscript at the close of the Golden Flowers of Apollonius are prayers which one “brother John Monk” confesses he himself has composed in the years 1304-1307.[892] In a later manuscript we find his prayers described as given to him by the blessed God and as “perfect science,” and they are followed by “The Pauline art,” discovered by the Apostle Paul after he had been snatched up to the third heaven, and delivered by him at Corinth.[893] Other works of notory art are listed in the manuscript catalogues without name of author.[894] But all alike are apt to impress the present reader as unmeaning jumbles of diagrams and magic words.[895] We shall sufficiently illustrate them all when we come to speak of the Liber sacratus which is itself in large measure concerned with the Notory Art.

[Sidenote: Other works ascribed to Solomon and Apollonius.]

Certain works may be mentioned which are ascribed to Solomon or to Apollonius in the medieval manuscripts, and which do not seem to be concerned with the notory art. Experiments ascribed to Solomon will be mentioned in another place in connection with experimental literature. Treatises of alchemy and astrology also were attributed to him.[896] Under the name of Apollonius we find a work on the properties or occult virtue of things, and another, or possibly the same, on the principal causes of things.[897] One wonders if it may have any connection with the book on six principles of things ascribed to Hermes Trismegistus and which has been discussed in our chapter on Hermetic Books in the Middle Ages. A treatise on palmistry is ascribed to Solomon in a fourteenth century manuscript at Cambridge.[898] A “Philosophy of Solomon” in a manuscript of the late twelfth century in the British Museum consists of “notes perhaps from more than one source on the analogy between the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the three divisions of philosophy (moralis, naturalis, inspectiva), and the three books of Solomon.”[899]

[Sidenote: Liber sacratus: preface.]

The Liber sacratus, as William of Auvergne twice entitles it, or the Liber sacer or Liber juratus, as it is also called in the manuscripts,[900] is associated with the name Honorius as well as Solomon, and is often spoken of as The Sworn Book of Honorius. The preface, as given in the Latin manuscripts of the fourteenth century--one of which once belonged to Ben Jonson--states that under the influence of evil spirits the pope and cardinals had passed a decree aiming at the complete extirpation of the magic art and condemning magicians to death. The grounds for this action were that magicians and necromancers were injuring everyone, transgressing the statutes of holy mother church, making invocations and sacrifices to demons, and dragging ignorant people down to damnation by their marvelous illusions. These charges the magicians hotly deny as inspired by the envy and cupidity of the devil who wished to keep a monopoly of such marvels. The magicians declare that it is impossible for a wicked or impure man to work truly by the magic art, in which they assert that the spirits are compelled against their will by pure men. The magicians further profess to have been forewarned by their art of this legislation against them. They hesitate, however, to summon the demons to their aid lest those spirits avail themselves of the opportunity to destroy the populace utterly. Instead an assembly of 89 masters from Naples, Athens, and Toledo has chosen Honorius, son of Euclid,[901] a master of Thebes, to reduce their magic books to one volume containing 93 chapters, which they may more readily conceal and preserve. And inasmuch as it has pleased the prelates and princes to order the burning of their books and the destruction of schools of magic, the followers of that art have taken an oath not to give this volume to anyone until its owner is on his death-bed, never to have more than three copies of it made at a time, and never to give it to a woman or to a man who is not of mature years and proved fidelity. Each new recipient of the sacred volume is also to take this oath. Hence the name, Juratus or Sworn-Book. Its other titles, Sacer or Sacratus, refer either to the sacred names of God which constitute much of its text or to its consecration by the angels.

[Sidenote: Incipit and Explicit.]

After this proemium, which, like the magic art itself, is probably more impressive than true, the work proper opens with the statement, “In the name of almighty God and Jesus Christ, one and true God, I, Honorius, have thus ordered the works of Solomon in my book.” Later Honorius reiterates that he is following the precepts and in the foot-prints of Solomon, whom he also often cites or quotes in course. The Explicit of the Sworn-Book is unusually long and sets forth in grandiloquent style the purpose of the volume.

“So ends the book of the life of the rational soul,[902] which is entitled Liber sacer or The Book of the Angels or Liber juratus, which Honorius, Master of Thebes, made. This is the book by which one can see God in this life. This is the book by which anyone can be saved and led beyond a doubt to life eternal. This is the book by which one can see hell and purgatory without death. This is the book by which every creature can be subjected except the nine orders of angels. This is the book by which all science can be learned. This is the book by which the weakest substance can overcome and subjugate the strongest substances. This is the book which no religion possesses except the Christian, or if it does, does so to no avail. This is the book which is a greater joy than any other joy given by God exclusive of the sacraments. This is the book by which corporeal and visible nature can converse and reason with the incorporeal and invisible and be instructed. This is the book by which countless treasures can be had. And by means of it many other things can be done which it would take too long to enumerate; therefore it is deservedly called The Holy Book.”

[Sidenote: A work of theurgy or the notory art.]

From this description it will be seen that the work has a good deal to do with the so-called Notory Art. Moreover, in the manuscript copy said to have belonged to Ben Jonson the word Theurgia is written on the fly-leaves before the beginning and after the close of the text. This calls to mind the passage in The City of God[903] where Augustine speaks of “incantations and formulae composed by an art of depraved curiosity which they either call magic or by the more detestable name goetia or by the honorable title theurgia. For they try to distinguish between these arts and condemn some men, whom the populace calls malefici, as devoted to illicit arts, for these, they say, are concerned with goetia; but others they want to make out praiseworthy as being engaged in theurgy. But they are both entangled in the deceptive rites of demons who masquerade under the names of angels.”

[Sidenote: Character of its contents.]

The text is full of the names of spirits, prayers in strange words, supposedly derived from Hebrew or Chaldaic, and other gibberish. Series of letters and figures often occur and names inscribed in stars, hexagons, and circles. An English translation in a fifteenth century manuscript[904] is adorned with pictures of rows of spirits dressed like monks in robes and caps but with angelic wings. The text does not seem to be complete in any of the manuscripts that I have examined,[905] but Sloane 3854 of the fourteenth century contains an apparently complete table of contents. The chapter headings, anyway, are more intelligible than the jargon of the text. The first chapter deals with the composition of the great name of God which contains 72 letters. The second is about the divine vision and by the time it is finished we are nearly two-thirds through the space allotted to the Liber juratus in one manuscript. The third chapter is on knowledge of the divine power, the fourth on absolution from sin, the fifth deals with mortal sin, the sixth with the redemption of souls from purgatory. With this the “first work” of the collection of Honorius ends. The opening chapters of the second work discuss the heavens, the angels found in each heaven and at the four points of the compass, their names and powers, seals and virtues, and invocation. Chapters 14 and 15 tell how to get your wish from any angel or to acquire the sciences. Chapter 16 tells how to learn the hour of one’s death, and chapter 17 how to know all things, past, present, or future. It was perhaps these chapters that William of Auvergne had in mind when, in censuring works on divination by inspection of mirrors, sword-blades, and human nails to discover stolen articles and other hidden things, he added that “from this pest of curiosity proceeded that accursed and execrable work called Liber sacratus.”[906] That work next returns for three chapters to the stars and planets and their virtues and influence. Chapter 21 then instructs how to turn day into night or night into day. Next spirits are further considered, those of air and those of fire, their names and their superior spirits, their powers, virtues, and seals. Attention is then given to the four elements and bodies composed thereof, to herbs and plants, and to human nature, after which aquatic and terrestrial spirits are discussed. The future life is then considered and the 33rd chapter, which is the last one of the “second work,” deals with “the consecration of this book.”

[Sidenote: The third “work.”]

The “third work,” which extends from chapter 34 to 87 inclusive, treats of the control of spirits by words, by seals, by tables, and by shutting them up. It tells how to provoke thunder and lightning, storms, snow, ice, rain, or dew; how to produce flowers and fruit; how to become invisible; how to wage war and to make an indestructible castle, how to destroy a town by means of mirrors; how to sow discord or concord, how to open closed doors, to catch thieves, fish, and animals, and to produce varied apparitions.

[Sidenote: The fourth and fifth “works.”]

The fourth work deals with similar marvels but it is stated that two of its chapters, namely, 91 on the apparition of dead bodies which speak and seem to be resuscitated, and 92 on the apparent creation of animals from earth, will be omitted as contrary to the will of God. The fifth work or book, which seems to coincide with the 93rd and last chapter of Honorius, is in reality divided into five chapters, which return to themes similar to those of the first work.

[Sidenote: How to operate with spirits.]

To illustrate further the character of the work a few particular passages may be noticed. We are told that there are three ways of operating by means of spirits: the pagan, Jewish, and Christian. The pagans sacrificed to spirits of earth and air but did not really constrain them. The spirits only pretended to be coerced in order to encourage such idolatrous practices. “Whoever wishes to operate by such experiments” (mark the word!), “deserts the Lord God.” As for the Jews, they get along only so-so, and “do in no wise work to obtain the vision of the deity.” Only a Christian, therefore, can operate successfully in such visions. “And although three kinds of men work at this art of magic, one should not think that there is any evil included in this name of magus, for a magus per se is called a philosopher in Greek, a scribe in Hebrew, and a sage in Latin.”[907]

[Sidenote: The seal of the living God.]

Very elaborate directions are given for the composition of the seal of the living God. Circles are drawn of certain proportions emblematic of divine mysteries, a cross is made within, numerous letters are written down equidistant from one another. A pentagon and two hexagons have to be placed just so in relation to one another; characters are inscribed in their angles; and various sacred names of God, Raphael, Michael, and other angels are written along their sides. Different parts must be executed in different colors; a particular kind of parchment must be employed; and the blood of a mole or hoopoe or bat must be used as ink for some of the writing. Finally, there are sacrifices, purifications, suffumigations, invocations, and prayers to be performed and offered. This seal, we are told, “will conquer the celestial powers, subjugate the aerial and terrestrial together with the infernal; invoke, transmit, conjure, constrain, excite, gather, disperse, bind, and restore unharmed; will placate men and gain petitions from them graciously, pacify enemies,”[908] etc., etc.

[Sidenote: Spirits of Saturn.]

The spirits associated with the planet Saturn are Bohel, Casziel, Uuchathon, and Dacdel. Their nature is to cause sadness and wrath and hate, to produce ice and snow. Their bodies are long and large, pale or golden. Their region is in the north and they have five or nine demons under them.[909] As a rule spirits of the north and south are ferocious, those of the east and the west gentle.[910]

FOOTNOTES:

[876] Brewer (1859), pp. 526, 531.

[877] The Nation, New York, May 10, 1919, p. 744. In January, 1922, it was announced that a paper by Professor C. C. McCown, “Solomon as a Magician in Christian Legend,” would appear in the Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society.

[878] De legibus, cap. 27.

[879] Cap. 11.

[880] Ed. of 1518, p. 22F2.

[881] Florence II-iii-24, 15th century, 74-77, “Liber in figura Almandel et eius opere / et eius iuditio”; 77, “Alius liber de Almandal qui dicitur tabula vel ara Salomonis.”

BN 7349, 15th century, #8, Annuli Salomonis.

[882] Sloane 3851, fols. 31v-53, “Signum Pentaculum Salomonis”; 3853, fol. 127v, Divine seal of Solomon; 3847, fols. 66v-81, “Opus mirabile et etiam verissimum de quatuor annulis sapientissimi Salomonis”; 3850, fols. 68-75, Salomonis opus de novem candariis celestibus. In a 16th century MS in French there is a book of conjurations of spirits ascribed to Solomon. The conjurations themselves are mainly in Latin. CU Trinity 1404 (VI).

[883] Harleian 3536, in French; Sloane 1307, in Italian, the translation being ascribed to “Gio. Peccatrix”; Sloane 3825 and 3847 are not identical versions.

[884] Sloane 3826, fols. 1-57; 3846, fols. 127-55; 3847, fols. 161-88; 3853, fols. 41-53. Perhaps the same as the “Sefer ha-Yashar” mentioned by Haya Gaon in the early eleventh century: Gaster, The Sword of Moses, 1896, p. 16.

[885] Sloane 3883, fols. 1-25, De modo ministrandi librum sacrum (revealed to Solomon by an angel).

Sloane 3885, fols. 1-25, “Liber sacer Salomonis,” repeated at fols. 96v-125; fols. 58-96, Tractatus de re magica ab Honorio filio Euclidis magistro Thebarum ex septem voluminibus artis magicae compilatus, et intitulatus Liber sacer, sive juratus.

[886] De legibus, caps. 24 and 27.

[887] Sloane 313, late 14th or 15th century (according to a Letter from Dr. Montague Rhodes James to me, dated 21 May, 1921), mutilus, quondam Ben Jonsonii, 26 fols., Salomonis opus sacrum ab Honorio ordinatum, tractatus de arte magica.

Sloane 3854, 14th century, fols. 112-39, Honorii Magistri Thebarum liber cui titulus “Juratus.”

[888] BN 7153, 15th century, Solomon, Sacratissima ars notoria.

Harleian 181, fol. 18-, Ars notoria (Salomoni ab angelo tradita) preceded at fol. 1- by Ars memorativa, and followed at fol. 81 by “de arte crucifixa.”

CU Trinity 1419, 1600 A. D., Liber de Arte memorativa sive notoria ... Prologus per Sallomonem ... Inc. sanctissima Ars notoria quam Creator altissimus per Angelum suum super altare templi quodam modo Salomoni dum oraret ministrans.

Math. 50 (Amplonius’ catalogue of 1412), “Item liber continens septem libros parciales qui dicitur angelus magnus vel secreta secretorum et est de arte notoria Salomonis et non debet rudibus exponi.”

CLM 19413, 10-11th century, fols. 67-108, Salomonis III formulae, might turn out to be a work on Notory Art.

[889] Sloane 1712, 13th century, fols. 1-22, “Ars notoria Salomonis, Machinei, et Euclidis,” followed at fols. 22-37 by an anonymous “ars notoria quae nova ars appellatur.”

BN 7152, 14th century, Expositiones quas Magister Apollonius flores aureos ad eruditionem et cognitionem omnium scientiarum et naturalium artium generaliter et merito et competenter appellavit; hoc opus Salomonis Machinei et Euclidii actoritate maxima compositum et probatum est: accedunt figurae.

[890] CLM 268, 14th century, 16 fols.; CLM 276, 14th century, fols. 1-26, Apollonii flores aurei, quorum pars extat in cod. 268.

Amplon. Quarto 380, 13th century, fols. 49-64, ars notoria Appolonii philosophi et magi; while the 1412 catalogue gives Math. 54, “Liber Appollonii magi vel philosophi qui dicitur Elizinus”; Amplon. Octavo 84, 14th century, fols. 95-106 (Apollonii) de arte notoria Salomonis.

Ashmole 1515, 16th century, fol. 4r, “Incipit primus tractatus istius sanctissime artis notorie et expositiones eius et temporum exceptiones, quas Salomon et Apollonius flores aureos appellaverunt, et hoc opere probatum est et confirmatum authoritate Salomonis, Manichei et Euduchii.”

[891] Sphere (1518), fol. 3.

[892] CLM 276, fol. 49.

[893] BN 7170A, 16th century, #1, de arte notoria data a Deo beato Joanni Monacho sive de scientia perfecta: praemittuntur orationes decern; #2, Ars Paulina, a Paulo Apostolo inventa post raptum eius et Corinthiis denotata.

[894] BN 9336, 14th century, “Sacratissima ars notoria.”

Amplon. Quarto 28, anno 1415, fols. 38-41, ars notoria et orationibus et figuris exercenda; Amplon. Octavo 79, 14th century, fols. 63-64, ars notoria brevis et bona.

Sloane 3008, 15th century, fol. 66-, de arte notoria, brief and illegible.

[895] Essentially similar is “The Sword of Moses. An ancient book of magic from an unique manuscript, with introduction, translation, an index of mystical names and a facsimile. Published for the first time,” London, 1896, by M. Gaster from a Hebrew MS of 13-14th century. Gaster (p. 18) describes the treatise as “a complete encyclopaedia of mystical names, of eschatological teachings, and of magical recipes.” The Sword proper is a series of names.

[896] Sloane 3849, 15-16th century, fols. 30-38, A noble experiment of King Solomon with astrological tables.

Ashmole 1416, 15th century, fol. 113v, Libellus de sulphuris virtutibus; 114-, Fragmentum de planetarum influentia; 123-, On perilous days; 123-4, Ars artium, or prayers to invoke spirits, is perhaps a portion of the Ars Notoria.

[897] Vienna 3124, 15th century, “Verba de proprietatibus rerum quomodo virtus unius frangitur per alium. Adamas nec ferro nec igne domatur / cito medetur.”

BN 13951, 12th century, Liber Apollonii de principalibus rerum causis.

[898] Trinity 1109, fols. 388-90, Expl. tract. de Palmistria Salamonis. The tract consists of two full page diagrams and an explanation in French.

[899] Royal 7-D-II, late 12th century, fols. 3-10, opening, “Hanc ergo triplicem divine philosophie formam....” I quote the description in the new catalogue of the Royal MSS.

[900] See above, page 281 of this chapter, notes 3 and 5.

[901] Possibly he is the same Euclid as one of the three co-authors of the work on the Notory Art mentioned above.

[902] One wonders if this can be the evil book of magic referred to by Roger Bacon and other writers as De morte animae.

[903] De civitate Dei, X, 9.

[904] Royal 17-A-XLII.

[905] Sloane 313 seems to reach only as far as the early chapters of the “second work.”

[906] De legibus, cap. 24, p. 68 in ed. of 1591.

[907] Sloane 3854. fol. 114r.

[908] Sloane 3854, fols. 114r-115v.

[909] Ibid., fol. 129v; Royal 17-A-XLII, fol. 67v.

[910] Sloane 3854, fol. 132r.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

L. ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL DREAM-BOOKS

Oneirocritica of Artemidorus--Astrampsychos and Nicephorus--Achmet translated by Leo Tuscus--Byzantine and oriental divinations by Daniel--Latin Dream-Books of Daniel--Sompniale dilucidarium Pharaonis--An anonymous exposition of dreams--Physiological origin of dreams--Origin and justification of the art of interpretation--Sources of the present treatise--Demoniac and natural causes of dreams--Interpretation--William of Aragon on prognostication from dreams--Who was William of Aragon?--His work formerly ascribed to Arnald of Villanova--Another anonymous work on dreams.

[Sidenote: Oneirocritica of Artemidorus.]

Both Jews and Greeks at the beginning of the Christian era were much given to the interpretation of dreams. There were “established and frequented dreaming places” at the shrines of Asclepius at Epidaurus, Amphiaraus at Oropus, Amphilochus at Mallos, Sarpedon in the Troad, Trophonius at Lebedea, Mopsus in Cilicia, Hermonia in Macedon, and Pasiphaë in Laconia. We hear of dream-books by Artemon, Antiphon, Strato, Philochoros, Epicharmus, Serapion, Cratippus, Dionysius of Rhodes, and Hermippus of Beirut. But the chief work upon the interpretation of dreams which has reached us from the time of the Roman Empire is that of Artemidorus, who was born at Ephesus and lived in Lydia in the time of the Antonines. He of course wrote in Greek and, despite the superstitious character of his work, in a pure and refined Attic style. The Ὀνειροκριτικά has also been translated into Latin, French, and Italian.[911] It is a compilation in five books gathered from previous literature on the subject and by the author personally in travel in Greece, Italy, and elsewhere. The first thirteen chapters of the fourth book, which Artemidorus opens with a general instruction to his son, deal with such preliminary and general considerations as the different types of dreams and more especially those divinely sent, the significance of times, the personal qualifications requisite in the interpreter, and certain rules of interpretation such as that native customs are good signs and foreign ways bad signs in dreams. But the great bulk of the work consists of specific interpretation arranged either under topical headings such as “Concerning Nativity,” or listed as single dreams.

[Sidenote: Astrampsychos and Nicephorus.]

In the edition of 1603[912] the work of Artemidorus is followed by much briefer metrical treatises on the same subject by Astrampsychos and Nicephorus.[913] These poems, if they may be so called, devote a line of interpretation to each of the things seen in dreams, and these verses are arranged in alphabetical order. This was to be the method of arrangement adopted in the medieval dream-books ascribed to the prophet Daniel. Astrampsychos is first named by Diogenes Laertius[914] in the early third century. He was supposed to have been one of the Persian Magi, and other occult treatises are ascribed to him, including astrological writings, a book of oracles addressed to Ptolemy, and love charms in a papyrus in the British Museum.[915]

[Sidenote: Achmet translated by Leo Tuscus.]

Still another work on the interpretation of dreams contained in the edition of 1603[916] is ascribed to “Achmet, the son of Sereim” or Ahmed ben Sirin.[917] The Greek text states that he was interpreter of dreams to Mamoun, the first minister of the Caliph, which fixes his date as about 820 A. D.[918] Perhaps he is the same Achmet who wrote an astrological treatise extant in Greek which he says he compiled from books from Adam’s time to the present day.[919] Of the work on dreams there is a Latin version in the medieval manuscripts translated from the Greek by Leo Tuscus,[920] who died in 1182 and was interpreter of imperial letters in the time of the Byzantine emperor, Manuel Comnenus. Leo prefixes to his translation a prologue addressed[921] to his brother Hugo Eterianus or Eteriarius (Ecerialius). This work of Achmet is of about the same length as that of Artemidorus and contains over three hundred chapters. It is or pretends to be drawn mainly from Indian, Persian, and Egyptian sources and often cites in turn the doctrine or interpretation of those three peoples, or mentions by name interpreters of dreams of the kings and pharaohs of those countries.[922] The preface states that the same dream must be interpreted differently in the case of king and commoner, of rich and poor, and according to sex. The time of the dream must also be taken into account. For example, to see a tree blossom is a good sign in spring but a bad omen in autumn. The hour of the night when the dream occurs and the phases of the moon are other time factors which must be reckoned with. The remainder of the treatise is devoted to specific interpretation of dreams.

[Sidenote: Byzantine and oriental divinations by Daniel.]

To Joseph and Daniel, as the chief Biblical interpreters of dreams, books on the subject were assigned in the middle ages, as John of Salisbury has informed us. Daniel, however, seems to have been the greater favorite. Liutprand the Lombard, who died in 972, says in the account of his embassy to Constantinople, “The Greeks and Saracens have books which they call the horaseis, or Visions, of Daniel, but I should call them Sibylline. In them is found written how many years each emperor will live, and what will be the character of his reign, whether peace or strife, whether favorable or hostile relations with the Saracens.”[923] A brief set of Greek verses in alphabetical order ascribed to the emperor Leo, which occur in a late manuscript with various works of the fathers, seem to resemble the Latin alphabetical dream-books of which we shall presently treat.[924] Works of divination were also attributed to Daniel in Syriac and Arabic, such as predictions of rain, hail, and the like for each day of the year, and of eclipses and earthquakes,[925] or astrological forecasts for each month of the year.[926] There is even a geomancy in Turkish ascribed to the prophet Daniel.[927]

[Sidenote: Latin Dream-Books of Daniel.]

Dream-Books ascribed to the prophet Daniel are found in Latin manuscripts at least as early as the tenth century, and continue through the fifteenth century despite the denial of their authenticity by John of Salisbury in the twelfth century. At least three different types of Dream-Books of Daniel are represented in incunabula editions in the British Museum.[928] The Dream-Book of Joseph occurs with less frequency.[929] These Latin Dream-Books do not go into details of politics like the Byzantine books which Liutprand described. The simplest form, which we have already mentioned in speaking of the Moon-Books of the tenth and eleventh centuries, is according to the days of the moon.[930] It is often embodied in the fuller versions. Their usual arrangement is an alphabetical list of objects seen in dreams with a line of interpretation for each and perhaps a page for each letter of the alphabet. Sample lines are:

Aerem serenum videre lucrum significat (“To see a clear sky signifies gain”) Intestina sua videre secreta manifesta (“To see one’s own intestines means secrets revealed”)

This alphabetical arrangement already appears in the early manuscripts.[931] Sometimes, however, the procedure is by opening the Psalter at random, taking the first letter on the page opened to, and then referring to a list where the letters of the alphabet have various significations, such as “A signifies power of delight,” “B signifies victory in war.”[932] This last method might, of course, be employed without having any dream at all, and perhaps should not be regarded as a Dream-Book. It is interesting to note that in one manuscript it is called Experiments of Daniel. In these books of Daniel further instructions are sometimes given, as when it is stated that dreams which occur before midnight are of no value for purposes of interpretation, or when one is told before opening the Psalter to repeat on bended knees a Lord’s Prayer, Ave Maria, and Miserere. Days to be observed are also sometimes mentioned as a sort of accompaniment to the Dream-Book: forty dangerous days “which the masters of the Greeks have tested by experiment,”[933] “bromantic days” from the twenty-fourth of November to the eighteenth of December, and “perentalic days” from the first of January to the first of March. “And these are the days when the leaves fall from the trees,” which is apparently supposed to have a disturbing effect upon the clarity of dreams.[934]

[Sidenote: Sompniale dilucidarium Pharaonis.]

A Sompniale dilucidarium Pharaonis, as it is entitled in the manuscript of it which I have examined,[935] or Morale somnium Pharaonis, as it is called in the printed editions,[936] was addressed by a John of Limoges[937] to Theobald, King of Navarre and Count of Champagne and Brie, who died in 1216.[938] It is really not a Dream-Book but a series of imaginary and fulsomely rhetorical letters between Pharaoh and his Magi, Pharaoh and Joseph, and Joseph and adulators and detractors. John states in his introductory letter to Theobald that the famous dream of Pharaoh will here be “morally expounded concerning royal discipline.” Pharaoh typifies any curious king; Egypt stands for any studious kingdom; Joseph represents any virtuous counselor; and the dream will be interpolated with flowers of rhetoric and theology.

[Sidenote: An anonymous Exposition of Dreams.]

More elaborate and making more pretense to philosophical character than the brief Dream-Books of Daniel is an anonymous work on dreams contained in a Paris manuscript of apparently the later part of the thirteenth century.[939] It is the first treatise in the manuscript, which further contains two important works of the first half of the twelfth century, namely, the Imago mundi of Honorius of Autun and the De philosophia of William of Conches. The texts of these two latter works are much cut up and intermixed with each other. It is therefore not unlikely that the opening treatise on dreams is also a work of the twelfth century, although there does not seem to be much reason for ascribing it either to Honorius of Autun or William of Conches. A long prohemium fails to throw much light upon the personality of the author, but the work does not seem to be a translation. That it is not earlier than the twelfth century is indicated by its citation of the Viaticum and Passionarius, presumably the well known medical works of Constantine Africanus and Gariopontus,[940]--unless indeed it be by Constantinus himself, to some of whose views it shows a resemblance.

[Sidenote: Physiological origin of dreams.]

The preface opens by stating that a desirable treasure lies hidden in the heart of the wise but that it is of no utility unless it is revealed. In other words, dreams must be interpreted. The author regards dreams, like thoughts in general, as beginning with the spiritus which rises from the heart and ascends through two arteries to the brain.[941] Our author perhaps still holds to Aristotle’s view of the importance of the heart in the nervous system as against Galen’s exclusive emphasis upon the brain, since he allots the heart a share even in mental processes; and he seems to be ignorant of Galen’s discovery that the arteries contain blood and not spiritus.

[Sidenote: Origin and justification of the art of interpretation.]

The preface goes on to justify the study of dreams on the ground that “the most ancient Magi and perfect physicians” thereby adjudged to each man health and sickness, life and death. “Medicine and divine thoughts, dreams, visions, or oracles are not prohibited, but demoniacal incantations, sorcery, lot-castings, insomnia, and vain phantasms are condemned that you may not readily trust in them.”[942] No doctrine is to be spurned wholesale, but only what is vicious in it. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego excelled all the Magi and soothsayers of the Chaldeans. Our author explains that among the Chaldeans then as today learning consisted not of the philosophy and sophistry of the Greeks and Latins, but of astronomy and interpretations of dreams. He alludes to a prayer of seven verses which they repeat when going to bed in order to receive responses in dreams. They pay little heed to the superficial meaning of their dreams, but by examining the inner meaning they learn either past or future. The author exhorts the person to whom he addresses the preface to do the same, laying aside all terrors that dreams may arouse in him. He points out that interpretation of dreams has Biblical sanction and that Joseph, Daniel, and Marduch all profited thereby.

[Sidenote: Sources of the present treatise.]

As for the present treatise, it is collected from divine and human scripture, based upon experience as well as reason, and drawn from Latins, Greeks, Persians, and the annals of Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar in which many of their dreams are recorded, for they were both lovers of the future and, since they had no philosophers like the Gentiles, God allowed them as a compensation to foresee the future in dreams. For by dreams life and death, poverty and riches, sickness and health, sorrow and joy, flight and victory, are known more easily than through astrology, a more difficult and manifold art.[943] But lest his introduction grow too long, the author at this point ends it and begins the text proper.

[Sidenote: Demoniac and natural causes of dreams.]

After stating what a dream is, the author discusses the origin and causes of dreams further. Some are from the devil or at least are influenced by demons, as when a monk was led to become a Jew by a dream in which he saw Moses with a chorus of angels in white, while Christ was surrounded by men in black. But when we see chimeras in dreams, this is generally due to impurity of the blood. The author also opines that, while the sage can judge from the nature of the dream whether there is fallacy and illusion of the demon in it, the origin of virtues and vices is mainly in ourselves. He who goes to sleep with an easy conscience is unlikely to be disturbed by nightmares and is more likely in quiet slumber to behold secrets and mysteries. The author next discusses the effect of the passions and exercise of the mental faculties upon the liver, heart, and brain. He adopts the common medieval view that the brain contains three ventricles devoted respectively to imagination, reason, and memory. He explains that the so-called incubus, popularly thought of as a dwarf or satyr who sits on the sleeper, is really a feeling of suffocation produced by blood-pressure near the heart. The interpretation of a dream must vary according to the social rank of the person concerned. As images in a mirror deceive the ordinary observer but are readily accounted for by the geometer, and as the philosopher notes the significations of other planets than the sun and moon, whose effects alone impress the vulgar herd, so there are dreams which only a skilled interpreter can explain. Dreams are affected by food and by the humors prevailing in the body, and also by the occult virtues of gems, of which a list is given from “Evax” or Marbod.[944]

[Sidenote: Interpretation.]

The second book takes up again the varying significations of dreams according to the person concerned, and also the significance of the time of the dream. The four seasons, the phases of the moon, nativity of the dreamer, and hour of the night are discussed. The remaining two-thirds of the treatise consists in stating the interpretation to be placed upon the varied persons and things seen in dreams, beginning with God and Jesus Christ, and continuing with crucifixes, idols, statues, bells, hell, the resurrection of the dead, and so on and so forth. Early mention of eunuchs and icons suggests a Byzantine source. More especially in the last third of the treatise, various marginal headings indicate that the interpretations are “according to the Indians” or “according to the Persians and Egyptians,” which suggests that use is being made of the work of Achmet or of Leo Tuscus’ translation thereof.

[Sidenote: William of Aragon on prognostication from dreams.]

The influence of Achmet’s work is also seen in a treatise on the prognostication of dreams compiled by master William of Aragon.[945] It opens by referring to the labors in this art of the ancient philosophers of India, Persia, Egypt, and Greece, and later it cites Smarchas the Indian,[946] whom I take to be the same as the Strbachan of Achmet’s second chapter. William justifies writing his treatise by saying that while there may be many Dream-Books in existence already, they are mere Practice and without reason, while he intends to base the prediction of the future from dreams upon rational speculation, and to support his particular reasoning by specific examples.[947] He makes more use of Aristotle’s classification of dreams[948] than the anonymous work just considered, from which he further differs in dwelling more upon the connection of dreams with the constellations.[949] The second part of his treatise consists of twelve chapters devoted to the twelve astrological houses.[950] Earlier he mentions that at the nativity of Alexander an eagle with extended wings rested all day on the roof of the palace of his father Philip.[951] In stating the signification of various objects William has a chapter on what different parts of the human body signify when seen in dreams.[952] Like our previous works on divination from dreams, he lays considerable stress upon experience, illustrating his statement that dreams are often due to bodily ills by cases which “I have seen,”[953] and also asserting that it is shown by experience that dreams seen on the first four days of the week are most quickly fulfilled.[954]

[Sidenote: Who was William of Aragon?]

This William of Aragon is no doubt the same who commented upon the Centiloquium ascribed to Ptolemy.[955] From his medical experience and his tendency to give an astrological explanation for everything one is tempted to identify him further with the William Anglicus or William of Marseilles who wrote the treatise of astrological medicine entitled, Of Urine Unseen, in the year 1219, but it is of course unlikely that the same man would be called of Aragon as well as of England and Marseilles or that the words Anglicus and Aragonia should be confused by copyists.

[Sidenote: His work formerly ascribed to Arnald of Villanova.]

The treatise on dreams has been printed among the works of Arnald of Villanova,[956] a physician who interpreted dreams for the kings of Aragon and Sicily at the end of the thirteenth century, under the title Expositio (or, Expositiones) visionum quae fiunt in somniis.[957] The Histoire Littéraire de la France[958] has noted that in the manuscript copies the work was anonymous and not ascribed to Arnald, but I believe that I am the first to identify it with the work of William of Aragon.

[Sidenote: Another anonymous work on dreams.]

In the same manuscript with the Sompniale dilucidarium Pharaonis and the work of William of Aragon on dreams just described is another long anonymous work on the interpretation of dreams.[959] It makes the usual points that the meaning of dreams varies with times and persons. But the treatise consists chiefly[960] of a mass of significations which are not even arranged in alphabetical order, a failing which it is attempted to remedy by an alphabetical index at the close.[961]

FOOTNOTES:

[911] Cockayne, Anglo-Saxon Leechdoms, RS vol. 35, 1864-1866, III. x. The Ὀνειροκριτικά was printed by the Aldine press at Venice, 1518; a Latin translation by Cornarius appeared at Basel, 1539; it was published in both Latin and Greek by N. Rigaltius at Paris, 1603; the modern edition is by R. Hercher, Leipzig, 1864.

I have not seen P. Diepgen, Traum und Traumdeutung als medizinisch-naturwissenschaftliches Problem im Mittelalter, Berlin, 1912.

[912] Its full title reads: _Artemidori Daldiani et Achmetis Sereimi F. (filius) Oneirocritica. Astranpsychi et Nicephori versus etiam Oneirocritici. Nicolai Rigaltii ad Artemidorum Notae_. Paris. 1603.

[913] They cover only twenty pages in large type as against the 269 pages of small type of Artemidorus. Astrampsychos was also published at Amsterdam in 1689 with the Oracula Sibyllina by S. Gallaeus.

[914] Proem. 2.

[915] Papyrus 122.

[916] See note 1 on this page. The work was previously printed at Frankfort under the title Apomasaris Apotelesmata or Predictions of Albumasar. There is some matter missing at the beginning of both of these editions of the work.

[917] Rigaltius, however, states that Achmet’s name did not appear in either of the two Latin MSS at Paris which he used, nor in the Greek one; but the opening of his text, as just stated in the previous note, seems defective.

On Ahmed ben Sirin see: Drexl, Achmets Traumbuch (Einleitung und Probe eines kritischen Textes), Munich dissertation, 1909; and articles by Steinschneider in Zeitschrift d. deutsch. Morgenl. Gesellschaft, XVII, 227-44, Vienna Sitzungsberichte, Phil-hist. Kl. CLXIX, 53 and CLI, 2: cited by Haskins (1918), p. 494, note 12.

[918] Krumbacher (1897), p. 630.

[919] Cat. Cod. Astrol. Graec., II, 122, Achmet, De introductione et fundamento astrologiae. ἡ ποίησις τούτου τοῦ τοιούτου βιβλίου ἐκ τῶν βιβλίων τῶν Περσῶν ὃ ἐποίησεν ὁ Ἀχμάτης, ὅστις ὡς ἔφη συνῆξε τὰ βιβλία τὰ εὑρισκόμενα ἀπὸ τοῦ Ἀδὰμ μέχρι τῆς αὐτοῦ ἡμέρας.

Since this astrological work mentions Albumasar, while Achmet, the author of the dream-book, wrote early in the ninth century, the editors of the Catalogus doubt if the two Achmets are the same, but it should be noted that in the astrological treatise Achmet is spoken of in the third person and that it may be a re-editing of his original work. On the other hand, perhaps this astrological Achmet is Alphraganus, or Ahmetus filius Ahmeti (Ameti), as he is often called.

[920] C. H. Haskins, Leo Tuscus, in EHR (1918), pp. 492-6. Leo’s activity as a translator is further attested by BN 1002, “Liturgia sancti Joannis Chrysostomi,” printed in Claudius de Sainctes, Liturgiae sive Missae Sanctorum Patrum, Antwerp, 1562, fol. 49.

[921] Haskins, op. cit., prints the prologue from the first of the following MSS of Leo’s Latin translation.

Digby 103, late 12th century, fol. 59-, “Ad Hugonem Ecerialium doctorem suum et utraque origine fratrem Leo Tuscus imperatoriarum epistolarum interpres de sompniis et oraculis.” “Explicit liber sompniorum Latine doctus loqui a Leone Thusco imperialium epistolarum interprete temporibus magni imperatoris Manuel.” Neither this Titulus to the prologue nor this Explicit appears in the printed edition of 1603.

Wolfenbüttel 2917, 13-14th century, fols. 1-20, “Ad Hugonem Eteriarium doctorem summum et utraque origine fratrem Leo Tuscus imperatoriarum epistolarum interpres de somniis et oraculis. Quamquam, optime preceptor, invictum imperatorem Manuel sequar per fines Bithinie Licaonieque fugantem Persas.” Haskins (1918), p. 494, shows that this statement applies to the year 1176 rather than 1160-1161 as scholars have previously held.

Haskins also lists the following MSS: Harleian 4025, fols. 8-78; Ashmole 179; Vatic. Lat. 4094, fols. 1-32v; but does not mention these:

BN 7337, 15th century, pp. 141-61, which has the same Titulus and includes the prologue, a table of 198 chapters, and the text as far as the 37th chapter, De ventre.

Vienna 5221, 15th century, 136 fols., “Laborans laboraui inveniendum ... / ... huiusmodi egritudinem jnueniret. Explicit liber sompniorum latine doctus loqui a leone Imperialium epistolarum interprete temporibus Magni Imperatoris Manuel.”

[922] Preface, “ac primo quidem secundum Indorum doctrinam, deinde Persarum, tum denique Aegyptiorum”; cap. 2, “Strbachan regis Indorum interpres ait”; cap. 3, “Baram Interpres Saanissae Persarum regi”; cap. 4, “Tarphan Interpres Pharaonis regis Aegyptiorum.”

[923] Quoted by Haskins and Lockwood, The Sicilian Translators, 1910, p. 93, from the Legatio, ed. Dümmler, Hanover, 1877, pp. 152-3.

[924] BN 3282, 17th century, fols. 27v-29r, Leonis (sapientis) imp. versus alphabetici de futuro judicio.

[925] Bodleian 3004, #15 (Qu. Catal. VI, Syriac, #161), Arabice literis Syriacis.

[926] Alger 1517 and 1518, in Arabic but according to the months of the Syrian year.

[927] Additional 9702.

[928] Sōnia Daniel’ (IA.8754), “Danielis somniorum expositoris veridici libellus incipit.... Ego sum daniel propheta unus de israhelitis qui captivi ducti sunt....”

Somnia Danielis et Ioseph (IA.31744), “Omnes prophete tradebant somnia que videbant in somniis eorum et solus propheta Daniel filius Iude qui captus a rege Nabuchudonosor....” This is followed by a second treatise which opens, “Incipiunt somnia quae composuit Joseph dum captus erat a rege Pharaone in egypto....”

Interpretationes somniorum Danielis prophete revelate ab angelo misso a deo (IA.11607, and IA.18164 is very similar).

The Incipit in the second edition is given in more nearly correct form in Sloane 3281, 13-14th century, fol. 39r, “Omnes homines tradebant sompnia que tradebant (?) ut solveret propheta daniel....”

Another opening, found in the MSS, states that the princes of Babylonia asked the prophet Daniel to interpret their dreams. See Digby 86, late 13th century, fols. 34v-40r, “Daniel propheta petebatur a principiis civitatis Babilone ut somnia que eis videbantur solvere (solveret?). Tunc sedit et hec omnia scribat (et) tradidit populo ad legendum.” The first two lines of interpretation are:

“Arma in somniis portare securitatem significat; Arcum tendere et sagittas mittere lucrum vel laborem significat.”

(“To bear arms in dreams signifies security; To draw bow and shoot arrows signifies gain or labor.”)

Bodleian 177 (Bernard 2072), late 14th century, fol. 64r, opens somewhat differently, “Danielem prophetam cum esset in Babilonia petebant principes,” and its first two lines of interpretation are:

“Aves cum se pugnare videre fecundiam significat; Aves in sompniis apprehendere lucrum significat.”

(“To see birds fight among themselves signifies fecundity; To catch birds in one’s dreams signifies gain.”)

[929] For a printed edition see the second item in the preceding note.

CLM 7806, 14th century, fol. 153, where as in the printed edition it follows a Dream-Book of Daniel.

Vatican Palat. 330, 15th century, fol. 303v.

[930] For instance, Chartres 90, end of tenth century, fol. 16, “Somnium Danielis prophete. Luna I. Quidquid videris ad gaudium pertinet. Luna II et III et IIII. Bonus affectus erit,” etc.

[931] Tiberius A-III, fols. 25v-30v; Titus D-XXVI, fols. 11v-16r; Sloane 475, fols. 217v-218r, breaking off in the midst of the letter B. In Harleian 3017, fol. iv-, however, the lines of interpretation are not in alphabetical order.

[932] This is the method in the second part of the printed edition numbered IA.8754 in the British Museum. See also: BN 7453, 14th century, #3, Ars psalterii a Daniele inventa; BN 7349, 15th century, Danielis experimenta sive modus divinandi ad aperturam psalterii et conjiciendi per somnia.

[933] Ashmole 361, 14th century, fols. 158v-159.

[934] Sloane 3281, fol. 39r; also in IA.31744, except that the names are misspelled.

[935] St. John’s 172, 15th century, fols. 99v-123, where the work is rather appropriately preceded by two treatises on Ars dictaminis. Our author, according to Fabricius, Bibl. Med. et Inf. Lat., Padua, 1754, IV, 90, also wrote De Stylo dictionario. Other MSS of the Sompniale are CUL Dd. iv. 35, 15th century, fols. 49r-73v, and Ii. vi. 34.

[936] The first 18 letters were printed at Altdorf, 1690, by J. C. Wagenseil, and in Fabricius, Cod. Pseud. Vet. Test., 1713, I, 441-96. For letters 19 and 20 see Fabricius, Bibl. Med. et Inf. Lat., 1754, IV, 91-4.

[937] Joannes Lemovicensis; but Fabricius calls him “Joannes a Launha, Lemovicensis.” Steele (1920) p. ix, calls him “Jean de Launha or de Limoges.”

[938] Steele (1920) p. ix, however, says, “but modern scholars put the date as about 1250, a much more probable one.” Steele does not add his references or reasons for this statement.

[939] BN 16610, fols. 2r-24r, Expositio somniorum. It opens, “Thesaurus occultus requiescit in corde sapientis et immo desiderabilis sed in thesauro occulto et in sapientia abscondita nulla pene utilitas ergo revelanda sunt abscondita et patefacienda que sunt occulta.” It closes, “... ventus si flavit in hyeme calidus fructus frugisque in illo loco erit copia frigidus et acer (?) ventus in hyeme visus per sompnium contrarium in messe significat si frigidus. Explicit expositio somniorum.”

The mistakes made in the text in such matters as case-endings and abbreviations indicate that our MS is not by the hand of the author but by that of some later and careless copyist. A number of corrections of the text have been made in the margin or between the lines, and apparently the same hand has written in the margin or between the lines a number of headings to indicate the contents. These occur chiefly, however, towards the close of the work.

[940] BN 16610, fol. 7v, “Fiunt preterea sompnia secundum qualitates ciborum et humorum a quibus et certissima signa ut diximus cuiusque infirmitatis capiuntur sicut in viatico et passionario demonstrantur.”

[941] The point is repeated in the text proper at fol. 4r. In the preface at fol. 2r the author also states that a small boy can be put into a stupor when standing up, by pressing his arteries between the thumb and forefinger so that “the vapor of the heart cannot ascend to the brain.”

[942] Ibid., fol. 3r.

[943] BN 16610, fol. 3v.

[944] BN 16610, fols. 4r-8r. In my summary I have followed the order of the text for the first book.

[945] BN 7486, fols. 2-16r, “Incipit liber de pronosticationibus sompniorum a magistro Guillelmo de aragonia compilatus. Philosophantes antiquos sive yndos sive persos sive egyptios sive grecos.”

St. John’s 172, early 15th century, fols. 140-52, where it appears anonymously.

It is listed in the 15th century catalogue of MSS in St. Augustine’s Abbey, Canterbury, 1545, Tractatus W. de Arrogon de interpretatione sompniorum.

[946] Simarchardus, as printed in the works of Arnald of Villanova.

[947] St. John’s 172, fol. 140v.

[948] BN 7486, fols. 3v-4r.

[949] Ibid., fols. 4v-6v.

[950] Ibid., fols. 10r-16r.

[951] Ibid., fol. 6r.

[952] Ibid., fol. 7v.

[953] Ibid., fol. 9r.

[954] Ibid., fol. 9v.

[955] Harleian 1, 13-14th century, fol. 76v-.

[956] See below for a chapter concerning him.

[957] In the edition of Lyons, 1532, at fols. 290-2.

[958] HL 28, 76-7.

[959] St. John’s 172, fols. 153-209r, “Summus opifex deus qui postquam homines ad ymaginem suam plasmaverit animam rationalem eidem coniunxerit ratione cuius malum a bono discernit suum creatorem laudando unde anima futura in sompniis comprehendit sive bonum sive malum in posterum futurum....”

[960] Ibid., fols. 153v-208v.

[961] Ibid., fols. 209v-212r.

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58. Petrus Hispanus

Chapter 59. Albertus Magnus. I. Life. II. As a scientist. III. His allusions to magic. IV. Marvelous virtues in nature. V. Attitude toward astrology.

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60. Thomas Aquinas

Chapter 61. Roger Bacon. I. Life. II. Criticism of and part in medieval learning. III. His experimental science. IV. Attitude toward magic and astrology. V. Conclusion.

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63. Three Treatises Ascribed to Albert

Chapter 64. Experiments and Secrets of Galen, Rasis, and Others I. Medical and Biological. II. Chemical and Magical.

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Foreword

In our preceding book on the twelfth century we included some writers, like Alexander Neckam, who lived on a few years into the following century but whose works were probably written in the twelfth. We now, with Michael Scot, begin to treat of authors whose period of literary productivity dates after 1200. We shall endeavor to consider the various authors and works in something like chronological order, but this is often difficult to determine and in one or two cases we shall purposely disregard strict chronology in order to bring works of the same sort together. Our last four chapters on Arnald of Villanova, Raymond Lull, Peter of Abano, and Cecco d’Ascoli carry us over the threshold of the fourteenth century, the death of the last-named not occurring until 1327.

Greater voluminousness and thoroughness mark the work of these writers as compared with those of the twelfth century. The work of translation has been partly accomplished; that of compilation, reconciliation, criticism, and further personal investigation and experimentation proceeds more rapidly and extensively. The new Friar Orders invade the world of learning as of everything else: of the writers whose names head the following chapters Bartholomew of England and Roger Bacon were Franciscans;[962] Thomas of Cantimpré, Vincent of Beauvais, Albertus Magnus, and Thomas Aquinas were Dominicans. In these representatives of the new religious Orders, however, theology cannot be said to absorb attention at the expense of natural science. The prohibitions of the study of the works of Aristotle in the field of natural philosophy by the University of Paris early in the century preceded the friars and were not lasting, and the mid-century struggle of the friars with the other teachers at Paris[963] was one over privilege and organization rather than tenets. Teachers and writers were, however, sometimes condemned for their intellectual views at Paris and elsewhere in the thirteenth century, and whether the study of natural science and astrology was persecuted is a question which will arise more than once. In any case the friars seem to have declined in scientific prowess as in other respects toward the close of the century. Petrus Hispanus, who became Pope John XXI in 1276-1277, had not been a friar himself, and is said to have been more favorable to men of learning than to the regular clergy. Finally, in Guido Bonatti, Arnald of Villanova, Peter of Abano, and Cecco d’Ascoli we come to laymen, physicians and astrologers, who were to some extent either anti-clerical themselves or the object of clerical attack.

This was the century in which Roger Bacon launched his famous eulogy of experimental science. A good-sized fleet of passages recognizing its importance will be found, however, in our other authors, and we shall need to devote two chapters to experimental books which were either anonymous or pretended to date back to ancient or Arabic authors. And not without some justification, since we have been tracing the history of experimental science through our previous books.

FOOTNOTES:

[962] Little that is new on the theme of the Franciscans and learning is contributed by H. Felder, Geschichte der wissenschaftlichen Studien im Franziskanerorden bis um die Mitte des 13 Jahrhunderts, Freiburg, 1904.

[963] Concerning it consult F. X. Seppelt, Der Kampf der Bettelorden an die Universität Paris in der Mitte des 13 Jahrhunderts, Breslau, 1905, in Kirchengesch. Abhandl., III; or H. Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, I, v, 2, “The Mendicants and the University”; or P. Feret, La faculté de théologie de Paris: moyen âge, Paris, 1894-1897, 4 vols.; and other works listed by Paetow (1917), p. 441.

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LI. MICHAEL SCOT

Bibliographical note--Michael Scot and Frederick II--Some dates in Michael’s career--Michael Scot and the papacy--Prominent position in the world of learning--Relation to the introduction of the new Aristotle--Thirteenth century criticism of Michael Scot--General estimate of his learning--God and the stars--A theological digression--The three Magi--Astrology distinguished from magic--The magic arts--Experiments of magic--History of astronomy--The spirits in the sky, air, and earth--Occult medicine--The seven regions of the air--Michael’s miscellaneous content--Further astrological doctrine--Omission of nativities--Magic for every hour--Quaint religious science--The Phisionomia--Influence of the stars on human generation--Discussion of divination--Divination from dreams--Works of divination ascribed to Michael Scot--Medical writings--Occult virtues--Astrology in the Commentary on the Sphere--Dionysius the Areopagite and the solar eclipse during Christ’s passion--Alchemy--Works of alchemy ascribed to Michael Scot--Brother Elias and alchemy--Liber luminis luminum and De alchemia--Their further characteristics.

[Sidenote: Michael Scot and Frederick II.]

But little can be said with certainty concerning the life of Michael Scot.[964] However, a poem by Henry of Avranches, addressed to the emperor Frederick II in 1235 or 1236,[965] shows that Michael was then dead and that he apparently had occupied the position of astrologer at the court of Frederick II at the time of his death. The poet explains how astrologers (mathematici) “reveal the secrets of things,” by their art affecting numbers, by numbers affecting the procession of the stars, and by the stars moving the universe. He recalls having heard “certain predictions concerning you, O Caesar, from Michael Scot who was a scrutinizer of the stars, an augur, a soothsayer, a second Apollo”; and then tells how “the truthful diviner Michael” ceased to publish his secrets to the world, and “the announcer of fates submitted to fate,” apparently in the midst of some prediction made on his death-bed. Michael’s own statements also show that he was one of Frederick’s astrologers.[966] If at the time of his death Michael was Frederick’s astrologer, it is more questionable at what date his association with Frederick began, and in what countries Michael resided with the emperor, or accompanied him to, whether Sicily, southern Italy, northern Italy, or Germany. From the fact that three of Michael Scot’s works, or rather, the three chief divisions of his longest extant work,[967] namely, Liber Introductorius, Liber Particularis, and Phisionomia, were written at the request of Frederick II for beginners[968] and apparently in the time of Innocent III,[969] J. Wood Brown jumped to the conclusion that Michael was Frederick’s tutor before that monarch came of age, and that he spent some time in the island of Sicily, from which Brown failed to distinguish Frederick’s larger kingdom of Sicily.[970] As a matter of fact, there would seem to be rather more evidence for connecting Michael with Salerno than with any Sicilian city, since in one manuscript of his translation for the emperor of the work of Avicenna on animals he is spoken of as “an astronomer of Salerno,”[971] while in another manuscript he is associated with a Philip, clerk of the king of Sicily, and this royal notary in two deeds of 1200 is called Philip of Salerno.[972] Brown was inclined to identify him further with Philip of Tripoli, the translator of the pseudo-Aristotelian Secret of Secrets.

[Sidenote: Some dates in Michael’s career.]

No date in Michael’s career before the thirteenth century is fixed. If it is true that the three sections of his main work were written under Innocent III, that places them between 1198 and 1216. The date of his translation of the astronomical work of Alpetragius or Alpetrangi (Nûr ed-din el-Betrûgî, Abû Ishâq) seems to have been in the year 1217 on Friday, August 18, in the third hour and at Toledo.[973] Brown holds that Michael translated Avicenna on animals in 1210 for Frederick II and that the emperor kept it to himself until 1232, when he allowed Henry of Cologne to copy it.[974] But the date 1210 perhaps applies only to a glossary of Arabic terms which accompanies the work and which is ascribed to a “Master Al.”[975] In a thirteenth century manuscript at Cambridge Michael Scot’s translation of Aristotle’s History of Animals is accompanied by a note which begins, “And I Michael Scot who translated this book into Latin swear that in the year 1221 on Wednesday, October twenty-first.”[976] The note and date, however, do not refer to the completion of the translation but to a consultation in which a woman showed him two stones like eggs which came from another woman’s womb and of which he gives a painstakingly detailed description. There is, however, something wrong with the date, since in 1221 the twenty-first of October fell on Thursday.[977]

[Sidenote: Michael Scot and the papacy.]

The career of Michael Scot affords an especially good illustration of how little likelihood there was of anyone’s being persecuted by the medieval church for belief in or practice of astrology. Michael, although subordinating the stars to God and admitting human free will, as we shall see, both believed in the possibility of astrological prediction and made such predictions himself. Yet he was a clergyman, perhaps even a doctor of theology,[978] as well as a court astrologer, and furthermore was a clergyman of sufficient rank and prominence to enable Pope Honorius III to procure in 1224 his election to the archbishopric of Cashel in Ireland.[979] At the same time the papal curia issued a dispensation permitting Michael to hold a plurality, so that he evidently already occupied some desirable benefice. Michael declined the archbishopric of Cashel, on the ground that he was ignorant of the native language but perhaps because he preferred a position in England; for we find the papacy renewing its efforts in his behalf, and Gregory IX on April 28, 1227, again wrote to Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury, urging him to make provision for “master Michael Scot,” whom he characterized as “well instructed not only in Latin but also in the Hebrew and Arabic languages.”[980]

[Sidenote: Prominent position in the world of learning.]

Whether Michael ever secured the additional foreign benefice or not, he seems to have remained in Italy with Frederick until the end of his days. He also seems to have continued prominent among men of learning, since in 1228 Leonardo of Pisa dedicated to him the revised and enlarged version of his Liber abaci,[981] important in connection with the introduction of the Hindu-Arabic numerals into western Europe.

[Sidenote: Relation to the introduction of the new Aristotle.]

Roger Bacon in the Opus Maius[982] in a passage often cited by historians of medieval thought ascribes the introduction of the new Aristotle into western Latin Christendom to Michael Scot who, he says, appeared in 1230 A. D. with portions of the works of Aristotle in natural philosophy and metaphysics. Before his time there were only the works on logic and a few others translated by Boethius from the Greek; since 1230 the philosophy of Aristotle “has been magnified among the Latins.” Although many writers have quoted this statement as authoritative in one way or another, it must now be regarded as valuable only as one more illustration of the loose and misleading character of most of Roger’s allusions to past learning and to the work of previous translators. We know that the books of Aristotle on natural philosophy had become so well known by that time that in 1210 the study of them was forbidden at the university of Paris, and that about that same year, according to Rigord’s chronicle of the reign of Philip II, the books of Metaphysics of Aristotle were brought from Constantinople, translated from Greek into Latin, and began to be read at Paris.[983] But Bacon’s date is more than twenty years too late, and we have already mentioned the translation of The Secret of Secrets, which Bacon regarded as genuine, the acquaintance of Alexander Neckam with works of Aristotle, Alfred of England’s translation of the De vegetabilibus and of three additional chapters to the Meteorology, the still earlier translation of the rest of that work by Aristippus from the Greek and by Gerard of Cremona from the Arabic, and Gerard’s numerous other translations of works of Aristotle in natural philosophy. The translations of Gerard and Aristippus take us back to the middle of the twelfth century nearly a century before the date set by Bacon for the introduction of the new Aristotle.[984] Michael Scot, then, did not introduce the works of Aristotle on natural science and Bacon’s chronological recollections are obviously too faulty for us to accept the date 1230 as of any exact significance in even Michael’s own career, to say nothing of the history of the translation of Aristotle.

This is not to say that Michael was not of some importance in that process, since he did translate works of Aristotle and his Arabic commentators, especially Avicenna and Averroes. Frederick II is sometimes said to have ordered the translation from Greek and Arabic of such works of Aristotle and other philosophers as had not yet been translated from Greek or Arabic.[985] But the letter which has been ascribed in this connection to Frederick is really by his son and successor, Manfred,[986] for whom many translations were made, including several Aristotelian treatises, genuine and spurious, by Bartholomew of Messina. Already, however, in 1231 and 1232 a Jew at Naples had translated Averroes’ abridgement of the Almagest and his commentary on the Organon, in the latter extolling Frederick’s munificence and love of science.[987] Michael Scot has been shown to have translated from the Arabic the History of Animals and other works on animals, making nineteen books in all, and also Avicenna’s compendium of the same, the De caelo et mundo, the De anima with the commentary of Averroes, and perhaps the Metaphysics or part of it.[988] His translation of the De caelo et mundo was accompanied by a translation of Alpetrangi’s commentary on the same.[989]

[Sidenote: Thirteenth century criticism of Michael Scot.]

Scholars of the succeeding generation sometimes spoke unfavorably of Michael’s work. Although Roger Bacon recognized his translations as the central event in the Latin reception of the Aristotelian philosophy, and spoke of him as “a notable inquirer into matter, motion, and the course of the constellations,”[990] he listed him among those translators who “understood neither sciences nor languages, not even Latin,” and charged more than once that a Jew named Andrew was really responsible for the translations credited to Michael.[991] Albertus Magnus asserted that Michael Scot “in reality was ignorant concerning nature and did not understand the books of Aristotle well.”[992] Yet he used Michael’s translation of the Historia Animalium as the basis of his own work on the subject, often following it word for word.[993] Michael was, however, listed or cited as an authority by the thirteenth century encyclopedists, Thomas of Cantimpré, Bartholomew of England, Vincent of Beauvais, and at the close of that century is frequently cited by the physician Arnald of Villanova in his Breviarium practicae.[994]

[Sidenote: General estimate of his learning.]

Michael Scot may be said to manifest some of the failings of the learning of his time in a rather excessive degree. His mind, curious, credulous, and uncritical, seems to have collected a mass of undigested information and superstition with little regard to consistency or system. Occasionally he includes the most childish and naïve sort of material, as we shall illustrate later. He continues the Isidorean type of etymology, deriving the name of the month of May, for example, either from the majesty of Jupiter, or from the major chiefs of Rome who in that month were wont to dedicate laws to Jupiter, or from the maioribus in the sense of elders as June is derived from Juniors.[995] He also well illustrates the puerilities and crudities of scholastic argumentation. Thus one of the arguments which he lists against regarding a sphere as a solid body is that solids can be measured by a straight line and that it cannot.[996] Asking whether fire is hot in its own sphere, he says that it might seem not, because fire in its own sphere is light and light is neither hot nor cold.[997] This argument he rebuts in the end, and he finally decides that a sphere is a solid. But he would have seemed wiser to the modern reader to have omitted these particular contrary arguments entirely. Such propositions continue, however, to be set up and knocked down again all through the thirteenth century, and such famous men as Thomas Aquinas and Peter of Abano are guilty of much the same sort of thing. To Michael Scot’s credit may be mentioned his considerable power of experimentation and of scientific observation. Perhaps some of the “experiments” attributed to him are spurious, but they show the reputation which he had for experimental method, and on the whole it would seem to be justified. The note in his name in a thirteenth century manuscript at Cambridge,[998] giving a carefully dated and detailed account of two human foetuses which had solidified into stones like eggs, shows a keen sense of the value of thorough observation and a precise record of the same. Experimental science would seem to have received considerable encouragement at the court of Frederick II, judging from the stories told of that emperor and the pages of his own work on falconry.[999]

[Sidenote: God and the stars.]

But let us examine Michael’s views and methods more particularly. In opening the long preface to his voluminous Introduction to Astrology he states that hard study is requisite to become a good astrologer, but he finds incentive to such effort in citations from Seneca, Cato, and St. Bernard that it is virtuous to study and to be taught, and in the reflection that one who knows the conditions and habitudes of the superior bodies can easily learn those of inferior bodies. The signs and planets are not first movers or first causes, and do not of themselves confer aught of good or evil, but by their motion do indicate “something of truth concerning every body produced in this corruptible world.” The hour of conception is important and Michael explains why two persons born at the same moment may be unlike. He then jumbles together from Christian and astrological writers such assertions as that the stars are only signs, not causes, and that their influence on inferior creation may be compared to the action of the magnet upon iron, or that we see on earth good men suffer and bad men prosper, which has usually been regarded as a better argument for a fatalistic or mechanical universe than for divine control. He agrees that the universe is not eternal and that everything is in God’s power, but insists that much can be learned concerning the future from the stars.[1000]

[Sidenote: A theological digression.]

Michael then embarks upon a long theological digression[1001] in the course of which he quotes much Scripture concerning the two natures, angelic and human. After telling us of the nine orders of angels in the empyrean heaven, he deals with the process of creation, just as William of Conches and Daniel of Morley had done in their works of astronomy and astrology. In the first three days God created spiritual substances such as the empyrean heaven, angels, stars, and planets; in the other three days, visible bodies such as mixtures of the elements, birds, fish, and man. Michael also answers various questions such as why man was created last, although nobler than other creatures, what an angel is, whether angels have individual names like men, and much concerning the tenth part who fell. Perhaps the emperor Frederick is supposed to put these queries to Michael, but there seemed to be no indication to that effect in the manuscript which I examined. The reply to the question where God resides is, potentially everywhere but substantially in the intellectual or empyrean heaven.[1002] Michael discusses the holy Trinity and thinks that we have a similitude of it in the rational soul in the three faculties, intellect, reason, and memory,[1003] although he attempts no association of these with the three Persons as William of Conches imprudently did in the case of power, wisdom, and will. He indulges, however, in daring speculation as to where the members of different professions will go after they die. Philosophers, “who die in the Lord,” will be located in the order of Cherubim, which is interpreted as plenitude of science; sincere members of religious orders and hermits will become Seraphim; while pope, emperor, cardinals, and prelates will enter the order of Thrones.[1004] Michael also contributes the following acrostic of eight sins whose initials compose the word, “Diabolus”:

Desperatio Invidia Avaritia Blasphemia Odium Luxuria Ventris ingluvies Superbia.[1005]

[Sidenote: The three Magi.]

In the course of the foregoing digression Michael inserted an account of the Magi and the star that appears to be based in part but with variations on the spurious homily of Chrysostom. He makes them three in number, one from Europe, Asia, and Africa respectively; and states that forewarned by Balaam’s prophecy they met together annually for worship on the day of Christ’s nativity, which they appear to have known beforehand. They stood in adoration for three days continuously on Mount Victorialis until on the third day they saw the star in the form of a most beautiful boy with a crown on his head. Then they followed the star upon dromedaries which, Michael explains, can go farther in a day than horses can in two months. Beside the star three suns arose that day at equal distances apart and then united in token of the Trinity; and Octavianus, emperor of the Romans, saw the Virgin holding the Child in the center of the sun’s disk. As for the word magus, Michael explains that it has a threefold meaning,--which, however, has nothing to do with the Trinity,--namely: trickster, sorcerer, and wise man, and that the Magi who saw the star were all three of these until their subsequent conversion to Christianity.[1006]

[Sidenote: Astrology distinguished from magic.]

The remainder of Michael’s lengthy and lumbering preface is largely occupied with the utility of astrology, which he often calls “astronomy” (astronomia), and differentiation of it from prohibited arts of magic and divination. While, however, he distinguishes these other occult arts from astrology, he affirms that nigromancers, practitioners of the notory art, and alchemists owe more to the stars than they are ready to admit.[1007] He also distinguishes a superstitious variety of astrology (superstitiosa astronomia),[1008] under which caption he seems to have in mind divination from the letters of persons’ names and the days of the moon, and other methods in which the astronomer or astrologer acts like a geomancer or sorcerer or tries to find out more than God wills. Scot also distinguishes between mathesis, or knowledge, and matesis, or divination, and between mathematica, which may be taught freely and publicly, and matematica, which is forbidden to Christians.[1009]

[Sidenote: The magic arts.]

Michael condemns magic and necromancy but takes evident joy in telling stories of magicians and necromancers and shows much familiarity with books of magic. He explains “nigromancy” as black art, dealing with dark things and performed more by night than day, as well as the raising of the dead to give responses, in which the nigromancer is deceived by demons.[1010] He repeats Hugh of St. Victor’s definition that the magic art is not received in philosophy, destroys religion, and corrupts morals. As he has said before, the magus is a trickster and evil-doer as well as wise in the secrets of nature and in prediction of the future.[1011] Michael lists twenty-eight varieties or methods of divination. He believes that they are all true: augury by song of birds, interpretation of dreams, observance of days, or divination by holocausts of blood and corpses. But they are forbidden as infamous and evil. Later on, in the text itself, he returns to this point, saying that these methods of predicting the future are against the Christian Faith, but nevertheless true, like the marvels of Simon Magus.[1012] Michael defines and describes various magic arts in much the same manner as Isidore, Hugh of St. Victor, and John of Salisbury; but with some divergences. Under aerimancy he includes divination from thunder, comets, and falling stars, as well as from the shapes assumed by clouds. Hydromancy he calls “a short art of experimenting” as well as divining. The gazing into clear, transparent, or liquid surfaces for purposes of divination is performed, he says, with some observance of astrological hours, secrecy, and purity by a child of five or seven years who repeats after the master an incantation or invocation of spirits over human blood or bones. He speaks of a maleficus as one who interprets characters, phylacteries, incantations, dreams, and makes ligatures of herbs. The praestigiosus deceives men through diabolic art by phantastic illusions of transformation, such as changing a woman into a dog or bear, making a man appear a wolf or ass, or causing a human head or limb to resemble that of some animal. Even alchemy, or perhaps only the superstitious practice of it, Michael seems to classify as a forbidden magic art, saying, “Alchemy as it were transcends the heavens in that it strives by the virtue of spirits to transmute common metals into gold and silver and from them to make a water of much diversity,” that is, an elixir. Lot-casting, on the other hand, both the authority of Augustine and many passages in the Bible pronounce licit.

[Sidenote: Experiments of magic.]

Michael more than once ascribes an experimental character to magic arts. Besides calling hydromancy “a short art of experimenting,” he states that, since demons are naturally fond of blood and especially human blood, nigromancers or magicians, when they wish to perform experiments, often mix water with real blood or use wine which has been exorcized in order to make it appear bloody. “And they make some sacrifice with the flesh of a living human being, for instance, a bit of their own flesh, or of a corpse, and not the flesh of brutes, knowing that consecration of a spirit in a bottle or ring cannot be achieved except by the performance of many sacrifices.”[1013] Despite his censure of the art in the preface under discussion, we find a necromantic experiment of an elaborate character ascribed to Michael Scot in a fifteenth century manuscript[1014] which purports to copy it “from a very ancient book,”[1015] a phrase which scarcely increases our confidence in the genuineness of the ascription. The object of the experiment is to secure the services of a demon to instruct one in learning. Times and astrological conditions are to be observed as well as various other preliminaries and ceremonies; a white dove is to be beheaded, its blood collected in a glass vessel, a magic circle drawn with its bleeding heart; and various prayers to God, invocations of spirits, and verses of the Bible are to be repeated. At one juncture, however, one is warned not to make the sign of the cross or one will be in great peril.

[Sidenote: History of astronomy.]

But to return to Michael’s magnum opus. The preface closes with a rather long and very confused[1016] account of the history of astronomy and astrology. While Zoroaster of the lineage of Shem was the inventor of magic, the arts of divination began with Cham, the son of Noah, who was both of most subtle genius and trained in the schools of the demons. He tested by experience what they taught him and having proved what was true, indited the same on two columns and taught it to his son Canaan who soon outstripped his father therein and wrote thirty volumes on the arts of divination and instructed his son Nemroth in the same. When Canaan was slain in war and his books were burned, Nemroth revived the art of astronomy from memory and was, like his father, deemed a god by many because of his great lore. He composed a work on the subject for his son Ionicon,[1017] whose son Abraham also became an adept in the art and came from Africa to Jerusalem and taught Demetrius and Alexander of Alexandria, who in turn instructed Ptolemy, king of Egypt, who invented astronomical canons and tables and the astrolabe and quadrant. The giant Atlas brought the art to Spain before Moses received the two tables containing the ten commandments. If this chronology surprises us, there is something more amazing to follow. At this point in the manuscript the copyist has either omitted a great deal[1018] or Atlas was extremely long-lived, since we next read about his showing the astrolabe to two “clerks of France.” Gilbertus (presumably Gerbert) borrowed the instrument for a while, conjured up demons--for he was the best nigromancer in France, made them explain its construction, uses, and operation to him, and furthermore all the rest of astronomy. Later he reformed and had no more dealing with demons and became bishop of Ravenna and Pope. Having thus got rather ahead of time, Michael mentions various other learned astronomers, most of whom really lived before Gerbert, such as Thebit ben Corat, Messahalla, Dorotheus, Hermes, Boethius, Averroes, John of Spain, Isidore, Zahel, and Alcabitius.

[Sidenote: The spirits in the sky, air, and earth.]

Having finally terminated his preface, Michael begins the first book with a description of the heavens and their motion. Some say that the planets are moved by angels; others, by winds; but he holds that they are ruled by divine virtues, spiritual and not corporeal, but of whom little further can be predicated, since they are imperfectly known to man and naturally will remain so.[1019] Later he states that they do not move or rule the celestial bodies naturally but as a service of obedience to their Creator.[1020] He has already spoken in the preface of spirits in the northern and southern air, and asserted that very wise spirits who give responses when conjured dwell in certain images or constellations among the signs of the zodiac.[1021] In the Liber particularis he speaks of similar demons in the moon.[1022] Now he mentions “a legion of spirits damned” in the winds.[1023] In later passages in the Liber introductorius he gives the names of the ruling spirits of the planets, Kathariel for Saturn,[1024] and so on, and a list of the names of spirits of great virtue who, if invoked by name, will respond readily and perform in marvelous wise all that may be demanded of them.[1025] And as the planets are said to have seven rectors who are believed to be the wisest spirits in the sky, so the seven metals are said to have seven rectors who are believed to be angels in the earth.[1026] Names of angels also occur in some of his astrological diagrams.[1027] This education of the reader in details of astrological necromancy shows that Michael is not to be depended upon to observe consistently the condemnation of magic and distinction between astrology and necromancy with which he started out in the preface.

[Sidenote: Occult medicine.]

By affirming that the physician must know the state of the moon and of the wind and that “there are many passions of the soul under the sphere of the moon,”[1028] Michael introduces us to the subject of astrological medicine, a theme to which he returns more than once in the course of the work.[1029] The practice of flebotomy is illustrated by a figure showing the influence of the signs of the zodiac upon the human body.[1030] From the fact that there are fourteen joints in the fingers of the hand or toes of the foot Michael infers that man’s span of life should be 140 years, a maximum which sin has reduced to 120.[1031] There are as many medicines as there are diseases and these consist in the virtues of words, herbs, and stones, as illustrations of which Michael adduces the sacrament of the altar, the magnet and iron used by deep-sea sailors, and plasters and powders.[1032] In some cases, however, neither medicine nor astrology seems to avail, and, despite his preliminary condemnation of the magic arts, Michael argues that when the doctor can do nothing for the patient he should advise him to consult an enchantress or diviner.[1033]

[Sidenote: The seven regions of the air.]

From the seven planets and sphere of the moon Michael turns to the seven regions of the air, which are respectively the regions of dew, snow, hail, rain, honey, laudanum, and manna.[1034] This is the earliest occurrence of this discussion which I have met, and I do not know from what source, if any, Michael took it. It is essentially repeated by Thomas of Cantimpré in his De natura rerum, where he gives no credit to Michael Scot but cites Aristotle’s Meteorology in which, however, only dew, snow, rain, and hail are discussed. In the History of Animals[1035] Aristotle further states that honey is distilled from the air by the action of the stars and that the bees make only the wax. Michael similarly describes the honey as falling from the air into flowers and herbs and being collected by the bees; but he distinguishes two kinds of honey, the natural variety just described and the artificial honey which results from the bee’s process of digestion. He also explains that sugar (and molasses?) is not a liquor which will evaporate like honey and manna, but is made from the pith of canes.[1036] “Laudanum” is a humor of the air in the Orient, and manna descends mainly in India with the dew, being found in Europe only in times of great heat. It is of great virtue, both medicinal and in satisfying hunger, as in the case of the children of Israel under Moses.

[Sidenote: Michael’s miscellaneous content.]

We cannot take the time to follow Michael in all his long ramblings through things in heaven above and earth beneath: sun, tides, springs, seasons, the difference between stella, aster, sidus, signum, imago, and planeta, the music of the spheres, the octave in music, eight parts of speech in grammar, and eight beatitudes in theology, zones and paradise, galaxy and horizon and zenith, divisions of time, the four inferior elements and the creatures contained in them, eclipses of sun and moon, Adam protoplasm and minor mundus as the letters of his name indicate, the mutable and transitory nature of this world, the inferno in the earth, and purgatory.

[Sidenote: Further astrological doctrine.]

Sooner or later Michael comes to or returns to astrological doctrine and technique, lists the qualities of the seven planets and head and tail of the dragon,[1037] explains the names and some of the effects of the signs of the zodiac,[1038] gives weather prognostications from sun and moon,[1039] states the moon’s influence in such matters as felling trees and slaughtering pigs,[1040] and expounds by text and figures planetary aspects, exaltations, and conjunctions,[1041] friendships and enmities.[1042] The planet Mercury signifies in regard to the rational soul, grammar, arithmetic, and every science.[1043] The election of hours is considered and a list given of what to do and not to do in the hour of each planet and that of the moon in each sign.[1044] There then follows, despite Michael’s animadversions in the preface against interpreters of dreams and those observing days, an “Exposition of dreams for each day of the moon,”[1045] nativities for each day of the week, and a method of divination from the day of the week on which the New Year falls.[1046] A discussion of the effect of the moon upon conception is interrupted by a digression on eggs: how to estimate the laying power of a hen by the color and size of its crest, the effect of thunder upon eggs, how from eggs to make a water of great value in alchemy, and how to purify bad wine with the white of an egg.[1047] Returning again to the moon, we are told that in the new moon intellects are livelier, scholars study and professors teach better, and all artisans work harder. Michael Scot used to say to the emperor Frederick that if he wished clear counsel from a wise man, he should consult him in a waxing moon and in a human and fiery or aerial sign of the zodiac.[1048] Michael had spoken earlier of the planets as judges of the varied questions of litigators,[1049] and now, although admitting the freedom of the human will, he proceeds to discuss at considerable length[1050] the art of interrogations by which the astrologer answers questions put to him. With this the Bodleian manuscript of the Liber introductorius ends, apparently incomplete.[1051]

[Sidenote: Omission of nativities.]

In the marginal gloss accompanying a Latin translation of the astrological works of Abraham Avenezra in a manuscript of the fifteenth century[1052] Michael Scot is quoted a good deal on the subject of nativities. But the Liber introductorius, or at least as much of it as appears in the Bodleian manuscript, contains little upon this side of astrology, except the brief nativities for each day of the week. A passage quoted by Brown[1053] to the effect that the person born under a certain sign will be an adept in experiments and incantations, in coercing spirits and working marvels, and will be an alchemist and nigromancer, appears in the manuscript as a marginal addition rather than part of the text and so is presumably not by Michael Scot himself.

[Sidenote: Magic for every hour.]

In connection with the subject of elections Michael gives a list of the prayers, conjurations, and images appropriate for each of the twelve hours of the day and of the night.[1054] For instance, in the first hour of the day men pray to God and it is a good time to bind all tongues by images, characters, and conjurations. In the second hour angels pray to God and images and other devices to promote love and concord should be constructed then. In the third hour birds and fishes pray to God and it is a good time to make images and other contrivances to catch birds and fish. In the first hour of the night demons hold colloquy with their lord and the time is favorable for the invocation of spirits.

[Sidenote: Quaint religious science.]

A more Christian and less magical enumeration of the hours occurs in the Liber particularis.[1055] At morning Christ was arrested on the Mount of Olives. In the first hour Christ was presented to Ananias and Caiaphas, the high priests; in the third hour, to Pontius Pilate; in the sixth hour He was brought back to Herod and taken to Mount Calvary; in the ninth He was given vinegar and gave up the ghost and the earth quaked and the veil of the temple was rent in twain; at vespers He was taken down from the cross. Another specimen of this quaint religious science is found in the Liber introductorius,[1056] where Michael, writing before the invention of the telescope, speaks of the limits set to seeing into the heavens except by special grace of God, as in the case of Katherine and of Stephen, the first martyr, who, when stoned, saw the heavens opened. A third example occurs in the third part of the opus magnum, or Phisionomia, where it is stated that at birth a male child cries “Oa” and a female child “Oe,” as if to say respectively, “O Adam (or, O Eve) why have you sinned that I on your account must suffer infinite misery?”[1057] In the same work Michael gives original sin as one of two reasons why a baby cannot talk and walk as soon as it is born.[1058]

[Sidenote: The Phisionomia.]

The third part of Scot’s main work, and the only section which has been printed, is that primarily devoted to the pseudo-science of physiognomy, which endeavors to determine a man’s character from signs furnished by the various parts of his body. The Phisionomia[1059] is addressed to the Emperor Frederick II who is exhorted to the pursuit of learning in general and the science of physiognomy in particular. This is probably a conscious or unconscious imitation of the remarks addressed to Alexander by the Pseudo-Aristotle in The Secret of Secrets, of which also a considerable portion is devoted to physiognomy, and from which Rasis and Michael borrowed a good deal.[1060] Indeed, the Phisionomia of Michael Scot is also often entitled De secretis naturae and really only a certain portion of it is devoted exclusively to physiognomy proper. Its early chapters and first part deal rather with the process of generation and it is only with the twenty-third chapter and second part that Michael “reverts to the doctrine of physiognomy.” Perhaps these chapters on generation had more to do with the popularity and frequent printing of the work than did those on physiognomy.

[Sidenote: Influence of the stars on human generation.]

In this discussion of the process of human generation the influence of the stars receives ample recognition. Michael regards the moment of conception as of great astrological importance; then according to the course of the stars and the disposition of the bodies conceiving the foetus receives “similarly and simultaneously” each and all of the determining factors in its subsequent nature and history.[1061] This we may perhaps regard as a medieval approach to the theory of Mendel. Michael further urges every woman to note the exact moment of sexual intercourse, when this is to result in generation, and so make astrological judgment easy.[1062] Yet he states later that God gives a new and free soul with the new body, just as a father might give his son a new tablet on which to write whatever he wills of good or evil.[1063] He notes the correspondence of the menstrual fluid to the waxing and waning of the moon and that planet’s influence during the seventh month of the formation of the child in the womb,[1064] and gives the usual account of the babe’s chances of life or death according as it is born within seven months, or during the eighth, or ninth, or tenth month. It is not quite clear if it is because there are seven planets that Michael affirms that a woman can bear as many as seven children at once.[1065] He adds that in this case the child conceived in the middle one of the seven cells of the matrix will be a hermaphrodite.[1066]

[Sidenote: Discussion of divination.]

Scot’s treatise on Physiognomy has considerable to say of other forms of divination and they here appear in a more favorable light than in his discussion of varieties of the magic arts in the preface preceding his Liber introductorius. Among signs to tell whether a pregnant woman will give birth to a boy or a girl he suggests “a chiromantic experiment”[1067] which consists simply in asking her to hold out her hand. If she extends the right, the child will be a boy; if the left, a girl. He also expounds methods of augury at some length, although again stating that they are in the canons of the church, that is to say prohibited by canon law. The divisions of space employed in augury are twelve in number after the fashion of the signs of the zodiac.[1068] Michael also discusses the significance of sneezes. If anyone sneezes twice or four times while engaged in some business and immediately rises and moves about, he will prosper in his undertaking. If one sneezes twice in the course of the night for three successive nights, it is a sign of death or some catastrophe in the house. If after making a contract one sneezes once, it is a sign that the agreement will be kept inviolate; but if one sneezes thrice, the pact will not be observed.[1069]

[Sidenote: Divination from dreams.]

Dreams and their interpretation are also discussed in the Physionomia.[1070] The age of the dreamer, the phase of the moon, and the stage reached in the process of digestion, all have their bearing upon interpretation. A dream which occurs before the process of digestion has started either has no significance or concerns the past. The dream which comes while the food is being digested has to do with the present. Only when the process of digestion has been completed do dreams occur which signify concerning the future. In order to recall a dream in the morning Michael recommends sleeping upon one’s other side for the remainder of the night or rubbing the back of the head the next day. Some dreams signify gain, others loss; some joy, others sadness; some sickness, others health, others war; some labor, others rest. For instance, to catch a bird signifies gain, to lose a bird in one’s dream signifies loss; to mourn in dreams portends joy, to laugh indicates grief. The rest of his discussion of dreams Scot limits to their significance in matters of health and physical constitution. He takes up dreams indicative of predominance of blood, red cholera, phlegm, and melancholy respectively; of heat, cold, dryness, and humidity; of excess of humors and of bad humors.

[Sidenote: Works of divination ascribed to Michael Scot.]

While on the subject of divination we may note that a geomancy[1071] and a chiromancy[1072] have been ascribed to Michael Scot, and also prophetic verses concerning the fate of Italian cities in the style of the Sibylline verses and prophecies of Merlin. Brown held that the evidence for the authenticity of these verses was as convincing as that for any event in Scot’s life.[1073]

[Sidenote: Medical writings.]

It would not be surprising to find that Michael himself practiced medicine as well as astrology, in view of the attention given to human physiology and the process of generation in his Physiognomy and elsewhere, and the interest in biology which his translation of the Aristotelian works on animals evidences. A treatise on prognostication from the urine is ascribed to him[1074] and “Pills of Master Michael Scot” are mentioned in at least one manuscript,[1075] where they are declared to be good for all diseases and of virtue indescribable.

[Sidenote: Occult virtues.]

Michael’s general allusion to the occult virtue of words, herbs, and stones in the Liber introductorius may be supplemented by a few specific examples of the same from the other two divisions of his main work. In the Liber particularis he mentions such virtues of stones as the property of the agate to reveal various signs of demons and illusions of enchantment, and the power of the jasper to render its bearer rich, amiable, and eloquent.[1076] In the Phisionomia he suggests that persons who cannot maintain physical health without frequent sexual intercourse may be able to do so by carrying a jasper or topaz.[1077] He also states that bathing in the blood of a dog or of two-year-old infants mixed with hot water “undoubtedly cures leprosy,”[1078] and that many sorceries can be wrought by use of the menstrual fluid, semen, hairs of the head, blood, and footprints in dust or mud.[1079]

[Sidenote: Astrology in the Commentary on the Sphere.]

Michael Scot’s Commentary upon the Sphere of Sacrobosco[1080] confines itself rather more strictly to astronomical and astrological topics than did the Liber introductorius, but otherwise their contents are not dissimilar. In the Commentary Michael discusses such questions as whether the universe is eternal, one or many, and what form or figure it should have; whether the mover of the sky is moved, whether the stars are spherical bodies, and whether the zone between the tropic of Capricorn and the Antarctic Circle is temperate and inhabited. Also whether the elements are four in number, and whether the heavens include a ninth sphere. One argument against its existence is that there are no stars in it, on which account some hold that it would exert no influence upon the earth. But Michael replies that it has light apart from any starry bodies and by virtue of this light does exert influence. Other astrological questions which he raises are whether the signs of the zodiac should be designated by the names of animals, whether the first heaven is a more potent cause of generation and corruption than the circle of the zodiac is, whether celestial bodies have particular properties as terrestrial bodies do, whether the heavens are animate, whether their motion is natural or voluntary, whether the motion of the planets is rational, and whether supercelestial bodies act upon inferiors by virtue of their motion. In mentioning the departments of life over which the seven planets rule, Michael cites either theologians or astrologers[1081] to the effect that Saturn signifies concerning pagans, Jews, and all other adversaries of the Faith, who are slow to believe just as Saturn is slow of movement and chilling in effect, while Jupiter is the sign of true believers and Christians.

[Sidenote: Dionysius the Areopagite and the solar eclipse during Christ’s passion.]

In commenting upon Sacrobosco’s concluding passage concerning the miraculous eclipse at the time of Christ’s passion and the remark attributed to Dionysius the Areopagite, “Either the God of nature suffers or the machine of the universe is dissolved,” Michael explains that ancient Athens was divided into three parts. One of these was the shore which was consecrated to Neptune, but in place of the plain and the mountains, Michael appears to take a leaf out of Plato’s Republic and mentions the region of the warriors, dedicated to Pallas, goddess of war, and the residential quarter of the philosophers, named the Areopagus from Ares meaning virtue and pagus meaning villa. According to Michael the altar to the unknown god was erected by Dionysius the Areopagite at the time of the darkness and earthquake accompanying Christ’s passion, and when Paul came and preached the Christ whom he ignorantly worshiped, Dionysius was converted, and became a missionary to the Gauls, bishop of Paris, and finally gained a martyr’s crown.

[Sidenote: Alchemy.]

In the Liber Introductorius Michael seemed to associate alchemy with the magic arts. In his Commentary on the Sphere his attitude is more favorable. After citing the fourth book of the Meteorology and other passages from Aristotle to the effect that no element can be corrupted and hence the transmutation striven after by the alchemists is impossible, Michael explains that the word element may be taken in two senses. As a part of the universe it is neither generable nor corruptible, but in so far as an element is mixed with active and passive qualities, it is both generable and corruptible.[1082]

[Sidenote: Works of alchemy ascribed to Michael Scot.]

Thanks perhaps to this passage the composition or translation of several works of alchemy is ascribed to Michael Scot in manuscripts or printed editions. The Quaestio curiosa de natura Solis et Lunae, which was printed as Michael’s in two editions of the Theatrum Chemicum,[1083] was apparently written after his death.[1084] A Palermo manuscript contains among other alchemical tracts a “Book of Master Michael Scot in which is contained the mastery.”[1085] In at least one manuscript Michael Scot is called the translator of the Liber luminis luminum, of which Rasis is elsewhere mentioned as the original author.[1086] In an Oxford manuscript a De alchemia is attributed to Michael Scot. It is addressed to “you, great Theophilus, king of the Saracens”[1087] rather than to the Emperor Frederick, and speaks of “the noble science” of alchemy as “almost entirely rejected among the Latins.” Michael Scot mentions himself by name in it rather too often for us to accept the treatise as his without question, while the allusions to “Brother Elias” the Franciscan as a fellow-worker in alchemy are perhaps also open to suspicion.

[Sidenote: Brother Elias and alchemy.]

We find, however, another suggestion of Brother Elias’s interest in alchemy and association therein with Michael Scot in the fact that in the same manuscript containing the translation of the Liber luminis luminum ascribed to Michael occurs another Liber lumen luminum which Brother Elias, General of the Friars Minor, edited in Latin for the Emperor Frederick.[1088] A brother Cyprian translated it from Arabic into Latin for him. In view of the later interest of another Franciscan friar, Roger Bacon, in alchemy and the supposition which some have entertained that he was persecuted by his Order because of his experimental studies, this reputation of Brother Elias as an alchemist is interesting to note. One of St. Francis’s earliest followers, he succeeded him in 1226 as General of the Order. Deposed by the pope in 1230 on the charge of promoting schism in the Order, he was re-elected in 1236 and was again deposed by the pope in 1239, after which he joined the imperial party and was excommunicated from 1244 until just before his death in 1253.[1089] Brown suggested that his alchemical activities were alluded to by the pope on the occasion of his first deposition in the words “mutari color optimus auri ex quo caput erat compactum.”[1090] But if Elias was an alchemist, no open objection to this appears to have been made either by the pope or his Order. Indeed, many of the alchemists in Italy of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were clergy and even friars.[1091]

[Sidenote: Liber luminis luminum and De alchemia.]

Brown has already discussed the contents of the Liber luminis luminum and De alchemia (or, alchimia)[1092] but erroneously and from not quite the same standpoint as ours. He incorrectly interprets “the secrets of nature” which the writer says he has investigated as the title of a book which has formed his chief source.[1093] Brown also states that one of several features which distinguishes the De alchemia from the Liber luminis “is an early passage which refers to the correspondence between the metals and the planets.”[1094] But there is a similar passage connecting seven metals with the seven planets in the opening paragraph of his own printed text of the Liber luminis luminum.[1095] The latter treatise, brief as it is, divides into five parts dealing with salts, alums, vitriols, spirits, and the preparation of alums, and the employment of these in transmutation. The De alchemia is less orderly in arrangement and seems largely a brief collection of particular recipes for transmutation.

[Sidenote: Their further characteristics.]

Both works emphasize the secret character of alchemy. The De alchemia holds forth concerning the great secret of Hermes and Ptolemy, and tells how most men’s eyes are blinded, and to how few the truth of the art is revealed. The Liber luminis luminum narrates that “when the great philosopher was dying he said to his son, ‘O my son, hold thy secret in thy heart, nor tell it to anyone, nor to thy son, unless when thou canst retain it no longer.’ Wise philosophers have yearned with yearning to know the truth of this salt. But few have known it and those who have known it have not told in their books the truth concerning it as they saw it.”[1096] Both works also are largely experimental in form and in the De alchemia we are assured more than once that “I, Michael Scot, have experienced this many times.”[1097] The books of the ancients and past philosophers are cited both in general and by name, but a black vitriol from France called French earth[1098] and a gum found in Calabria and at Montpellier[1099] are mentioned as well as herbs and minerals from India and Alexandria, and we also hear of the experiments of brother Elias, certain Saracens who seem of comparatively recent date, and of the operation at Catania or Cortona by master Jacob the Jew which “I afterwards proved many times.”[1100] The Liber luminis luminum often speaks of “the great virtue” of this or that, and both treatises make much use of animal substances such as “dust of moles,” the urine of the taxo or of a boy, the blood of a ruddy man or of an owl or frog. Five toads are shut up in a vessel and made to drink the juices of various herbs with vinegar as the first step in the preparation of a marvelous powder for purposes of transmutation.[1101]

FOOTNOTES:

[964] James Wood Brown, An inquiry into the life and legend of Michael Scot, Edinburgh, 1897. While this book has been sharply criticized (for instance, by H. Niese in HZ, CVIII (1912), p. 497) and has its failings, such as an unsatisfactory method of presenting its citations and authorities, it gives, obscured by much verbiage intended to make the book interesting and popular and much fanciful speculation as to what may have been, a more reliable account of Michael’s life and a fuller bibliography of his writings than had existed previously. But it must be used with caution.

Liber introductorius: extant only in MSS, of which some are:

Bodleian 266, 15th century, 218 fols. “Quicumque vult esse bonus astrologus ... / ... finitur tractatus de notitia pronosticorum.” This is the MS which I have used.

CLM 10268, 14th century, 146 fols. Described by F. Boll (1903), p. 439. I tried to inspect this MS when I was in Munich in 1912 but it had been loaned out of the library at that time.

Brown further mentions BN nouv. acq. 1401 and an Escorial MS of the 14th century which I presume is the same as Escorial F-III-8, 14th century, fols. 1-126, “Incipit prohemium libri introductorii quem edidit Michael Scotus,” etc.

The following are perhaps extracts from the Liber Introductorius:

BN 14070, 13th-14th-15th century, fol. 112-, Mich. Scoti de notitia conjunctionis mundi terrestris cum celesti; fol. 115-, Eiusdem de presagiis stellarum.

Vienna 3124, 15th century, fols. 206-11, “Capitulum de hiis quae generaliter significantur in partibus duodecim celi sive domibus.”

Vatican 4087, fol. 38r, “Explicit liber quem edidit micael scotus de signis et ymaginibus celi.”

See also MSS mentioned by Brown at p. 27, note 2.

* * * * *

Liber particularis, or Astronomia; also extant only in MSS.

Canon. Misc. 555, early 14th century, fols. 1-59. “Cum ars astronomie sit grandis sermonibus philosophorum....” This is the MS I have used; others are:

Escorial E-III-15, 14th century, fols. 41-51, Michaelis Scoti ars astronomiae ad Federicum imperatorem II.

CLM 10663, 18th century, 261 fols., Michael Scot, Astronomia.

At Milan, Ambros. L. 92.

* * * * *

Phisionomia: eighteen editions are said to have appeared between 1477 and 1660. I have used the following text:

Michael Scot, De secretis naturae, Amsterdam, 1740, where it follows at pp. 204-328 the De secretis mulierum and other treatises ascribed to Albertus Magnus.

It occurs at fols. 59-88 of Canon. Misc. 555, immediately after the Liber particularis, and is found in other MSS.

* * * * *

Commentary on The Sphere of Sacrobosco.

Eximii atque excellentissimi physicorum motuum cursusque siderei indagatoris Michaelis Scoti super auctorem sperae cum questionibus diligenter emendatis incipit expositio confecta Illustrissimi Imperatoris Dn̄i D. Fedrici precibus, Bologna, 1495. I have also used an edition of 1518, and there are others.

* * * * *

Liber lumen luminum.

Riccardian 119, fols. 35v-37r, “Incipit liber luminis luminum translatus a magistro michahele scoto philosopho.”

Printed by Brown (1897), Appendix III, pp. 240-68.

I presume it is the same as the Lumen luminum ascribed to Rasis in BN 6517 and 7156--see Berthelot (1893), I, 68--but I have not compared them.

In the same Riccard. 119 at fol. 166r is a Liber lumen luminum ascribed to Brother Elias, general of the Franciscans. “Incipit liber alchimicalis quem frater helya edidit apud fredericum Imperatorem. Liber lumen luminum translatus de sarraceno ac arabico in latinum a fratre cypriano ac compositus in latinum a generali fratrum minorum super alchimicis. Incipit liber qui lumen luminum dicitur ex libris medicorum et experimentis et philosophorum et disciplinarum ex(t)ranearum.”

* * * * *

De alchimia (or, alchemia)

Corpus Christi 125, fols. 97v-100v, Michaelis Scoti ad Theophilum Saracenorum regem “de alkemia.” “Explicit tractatus magistri michaelis Scoti de alke.”

The above-mentioned books and manuscripts are those especially discussed and utilized in the present chapter. The following may be noted, since they are omitted by Brown, although they have little to do with our investigation:

Mensa philosophica. Of this brief work ascribed to Michael Scot several incunabula exist in the library of the British Museum.

* * * * *

Amplon. Folio 179, 14th century, fols. 98-99, “Liber translative theologie de decem kathegoriis.” The attribution of this to Michael Scot might be taken to support the tradition that he was a doctor of theology at Paris.

[965] The poem is printed in Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte, XVIII (1878), p. 486. Yet Cantor II (1913), p. 7, has Michael outlive Frederick and transfer his residence to the court of Edward I of England.

[966] Canon. Misc. 555, fol. 44v, “Quadam vice me michaelem scotum sibi fidelem inter ceteros astrologos domestice advocavit.”

[967] That they are sections of one work is made clear from his statement at the end of the long preface to all three: Bodleian 266, fol. 25v; Boll (1903), p. 439, quotes the same passage from CLM 10268.

[968] “Scolares novitii.”

[969] The MSS say “Innocent IV,” but Michael had died before his pontificate.

[970] Brown (1897), chapter II. Criticized by H. Niese in Historische Zeitschrift, vol. 108 (1912), p. 497, note 3.

[971] Bologna University Library 693, 16th century, “Michaelis Scoti astronomi Salernitani liber de animalibus. Incipit liber primus de animalibus Avicenne rubrica. Frederice domine mundi Romanorum Imperator, suscipe devote hunc laborem Michaelis Scoti.”

[972] Laurentian P. lxxxix, sup. cod. 38, 15th century, p. 409; printed in Brown (1897), pp. 231-4. Concerning Philip see also Brown, pp. 19, 36-7. The important passage in the MS is, “Explicit nicromantiae experimentum illustrissimi doctoris Domini Magistri Michaelis Scoti, qui summus inter alios nominatur Magister, qui fuit Scotus, et servus praeclarissimo Domino Philipo Regis Ceciliae coronato; quod destinavit sibi dum esset aegrotus in civitate Cordubae, etc. Finis.” Brown, p. 19, translates the last clause, “which experiment he (i. e., Michael) contrived when he lay sick in the city of Cordova,” and so concludes that Scot visited that city; but I should translate it, “which he (Michael) sent to him (Philip) while he (Philip) lay sick in the city of Cordova.” Otherwise why is Philip mentioned at all?

[973] Brown, p. 104, citing Jourdain, Recherches, p. 133, who called attention to two Paris MSS, Anciens fonds 7399 and Fonds de Sorbonne 1820, in one of which the MS is dated 1217, while the other gives the year as 1255 which is the exactly corresponding year of the Spanish era. Arsenal 1035, 14th century, fol. 112, a MS not noted by Jourdain or Brown, states the year as 1207 A. D., but this is evidently a mistake for 1217, since it gives the same day of the week and month as the other MSS and August 18th fell on Friday in 1217, but not in 1207. BN 16654, 13th century, fol. 33, gives the date as 1217.

[974] P. 55, arguing from a Vatican MS which is described at pp. 235-7.

[975] “Glosa magistri al. Explicit anno domini mccx.”

[976] Gonville and Caius 109, fols. 102v-103r, written in a different hand from the text of the History of Animals, “Et iuro ego michael scotus qui dedi hunc librum latinitati quod in anno MCCXXI, xii kal. novembr. die mercurii....”

[977] Perhaps the year is correct, but “xii kal.” should be “xiii kal.”

[978] HL XX, 47; Brown (1897), p. 14; both citing Du Boulay, Hist. univ. Paris., 1656-1675.

[979] See Denifle et Chatelain, Chartularium Universitatis Parisiensis, 1889, I, 104, for a letter of Honorius III of January 16, 1224, asking Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury, to secure a benefice for Michael Scot whom he calls “singularly gifted in science among men of learning”: and Theiner, Vetera Monumenta Hibernorum et Scotorum, Rome, 1864, p. 23, for a letter of Honorius III of June in the same year, stating that Michael has declined the archbishopric of Cashel and appointing another man. Brown has incorrectly dated both letters in 1223.

[980] Denifle and Chatelain, I, 110.

[981] For the date and MSS see Boncompagni, Intorno ad alcune opere di Leonardo Pisano, Rome, 1854, pp. 2 and 129-30.

[982] Bridges (1897) I, 55; in Jebb’s edition, pp. 35-6.

[983] Rigordus de Gestis Philippi II; quoted in the Leo XIII edition of Aquinas, Rome, 1882, vol. I, p. cclix, “legi Parisiis coepisse libellos quosdam aristotelis, qui docebant metaphysicum, de novo Constantinopoli delatos et a graeco in latinum translatos.”

[984] P. Duhem, “Du temps où la Scolastique latine a connu la physique d’Aristote,” in Revue de philosophie, August, 1909, pp. 163-78, argues that the Physics was known to Latins in the twelfth century.

[985] Petrus de Vineis III, ep. lxvii; Latin cited in Dissertation 23 in vol. I of the Rome, 1882, edition of the works of Aquinas. Frederick II is not even mentioned in Grabmann’s dissertation on the translation of Aristotle in the thirteenth century. In the preface to his De arte venandi cum avibus Frederick refuses to follow Aristotle who, he says, had little or no practice in falconry: Haskins, EHR XXXVI (1921) 343-4.

[986] The letter of Manfred accompanied his gift to the University of Paris of copies of the translations made for him. See Chartularium Universitatis Parisiensis, I, 435-6.

[987] Renan, Averroès et Averroïsme, p. 188.

[988] Grabmann (1916), pp. 143-4, 175-6, 186-7, 198.

[989] BN 17155, 13th century, fol. 225-.

[990] Brown, 145.

[991] Brown, 119, Brewer (1859), p. 91.

[992] Meteor. III, iv. 26 (Borgnet, IV, 697).

[993] See Jourdain, Recherches, etc., and more recently H. Stadler, “Irrtümer des Albertus Magnus bei Benutzung des Aristoteles,” in Archiv f. d. Gesch. d. Naturwissenschaften u. d. Technik, VI (1913) 387-93.

[994] De Renzi, I, 292.

[995] Canon. Misc. 555, fol. 6.

[996] Sphere (1518), p. 106.

[997] Ibid., p. 107.

[998] Gonville and Caius 109, fol. 1O2v-1O3r.

[999] C. H. Haskins, “The ‘De Arte Venandi cum Avibus’ of the Emperor Frederick II,” EHR XXXVI (1921) 334-55.

[1000] Bodleian 266, fols. 1r-v. Future citations, unless otherwise specified, will be to this MS.

[1001] It extends from fol. 2 to fol. 19.

[1002] fol. 4r.

[1003] fol. 10r.

[1004] fols. 11v-12r.

[1005] fol. 17v.

[1006] fol. 3r-v.

[1007] fols. 2 and 20v.

[1008] fols. 21v-22r.

[1009] fol. 22r.

[1010] fol. 22v.

[1011] In another passage at fol. 23r which speaks of a magus as inspecting entrails of animals I take it that the word is a slip of the copyist for haruspex.

[1012] fol. 175r.

[1013] fol. 22v.

[1014] Printed by Brown (1897), pp. 231-4.

[1015] Ibid., p. 18.

[1016] At least in the MS which I have used; Bodleian 266, fols. 24r-25r.

[1017] What purported to be this work is listed in the Speculum astronomiae of Albertus Magnus, and Haskins, “Nimrod the Astronomer,” Romanic Review, V. (1914), 203-12, has called attention to the following MSS: S. Marco VIII, 22; Vatic. Pal. Lat. 1417; and an extract in Ashmole 191. Haskins notes various mentions of Nimrod as an astronomer in medieval authors, but not the above passage from Michael Scot. Although Latin writers make Ioathon or Ionaton (and various other spellings) the disciple of Nimrod, in Syrian writers Ionitus is the fourth son of Noah and himself the discoverer of astronomy and teacher of Nimrod (Haskins, op. cit. 210-11).

[1018] The word Explicit is written across the knees of a figure of the giant Athalax or Caclon who supports the heavens on his head at fol. 25r, col. 1, but the passage concerning “Gilbertus” follows and the proper Explicit of the preface does not occur until fol. 25v, col. 1. See Haskins, op. cit. p. 207 for pictures in the MSS of Atlas and Nimrod side by side, the one standing on the Pyrenees and supporting the starry firmament; the other on the mount of the Amorites bearing the starless heavens.

[1019] fol. 28r-v; also Canon. Misc. 555, fol. 22r.

[1020] fol. 68v.

[1021] fol. 21v.

[1022] Canon. Misc. 555, fol. 17v.

[1023] fol. 29v.

[1024] fols. 150v-158r.

[1025] fol. 172.

[1026] fol. 145v.

[1027] fol. 128v.

[1028] fols. 30r, 31r.

[1029] fol. 174r.

[1030] fol. 144v.

[1031] fol. 173v.

[1032] fol. 173r, “Nam tot sunt medicine quot sunt infirmitates et hae constant in tribus videlicet in verbis, herbis, et lapidibus, virtutes quorum quotidie videmus ut in hostia sacrata super altare, in magnete et ferro navigantes in alto mari, et in emplastris, pulveribus, et consertis.”

[1033] fol. 175v.

[1034] fols. 32v-35r.

[1035] Hist. Animal. V, xix, 4.

[1036] fol. 35r, “de zuccaro et zaccara. Saccarum et zathara non sunt liquores vaporabiles ut mel et manna sed sit de medula cannarum.”

[1037] fols. 44r et seq.; fols. 150-8.

[1038] fol. 75r et seq.; fols. 108-114.

[1039] fols. 117-8.

[1040] fol. 89.

[1041] fol. 124 et seq.; fols. 132-5.

[1042] fols. 145v-147v.

[1043] fol. 45r.

[1044] fols. 162v-163.

[1045] fol. 164v.

[1046] fol. 165.

[1047] fol. 176r-v.

[1048] fol. 177v.

[1049] fol. 28r.

[1050] fols. 178-218.

[1051] As Madan’s description of the MS says, “The first book contains four distinctiones, of which the second ends on fol. 178, but it is difficult to state whether the MS contains anything beyond the first portion of the third distinctio of this first book, owing to the absence of decisive rubrics.”

F. Boll (1903) states that the fourth distinctio is also missing in CLM 10268.

[1052] BN 7438, 15th century.

[1053] In a footnote at page 185, from Bodl. 266, fol. 113.

[1054] fol. 162r.

[1055] Canon. Misc. 555, fol. 4.

[1056] Bodleian 266, fol. 47r.

[1057] Phisionomia (1740) cap. xi, p. 235.

[1058] Ibid., cap. ix, p. 229.

[1059] Or Phisonomia as it is often spelled in the medieval texts themselves.

[1060] Brown (1897), 32 and 37.

[1061] Edition of 1740, p. 210, “Et secundum cursum corporum superiorum sicut dispositionem corporum concipientium foetus recipit similiter et semel omnia et singula quae postea discernunt ordinem temporum et naturae.”

[1062] Cap. 7 (1740), p. 226.

[1063] Cap. 8 (1740), p. 228.

[1064] Cap. 3 (1740), p. 218; cap. 10, p. 230.

[1065] Cap. 2 (1740), p. 213.

[1066] Cap. 7 (1740), p. 227.

[1067] Cap. 18 (1740), p. 248, “In chiromantia est illud experimentum....”

[1068] De notitia auguriorum, cap. 57 (1740), p. 285.

[1069] Cap. 58 (1740), pp. 288, 289, 290.

[1070] Caps. 46-56 (1740), p. 280, et seq.

[1071] CLM 489, 16th century.

[1072] Chiromantica Scientia, quarto minori sine notis typographicis, foliis 28 constat impressis. “Ex divina philosophorum academia secundum nature vires ad extra chyromantitio diligentissime collectum. Exordium.” Cl. Denis, qui alias editiones huius operis adfert, Michaelum Scotum auctorem eiusdem censeri tradit.

[1073] Brown (1897), 163 et seq.

[1074] Vatican, Regina di Svezia, 1159, fol. 149, “Finis urinarum Magistri Michaelis Scoti.” To the two MSS listed by Brown, p. 153, note 6, containing an Italian translation, may be added Perugia 316, 15th century, fols. 91-106, “Qui chomenza el tractato delle orine secondo come mete maistro Michelle sthato strollogo del re Ferigo ai nostri bexogni.”

[1075] Addit. 24068, 13th century, fol. 97v.

[1076] Canon. Misc. 555, fol. 50r-v.

[1077] (1740), p. 222.

[1078] Phisionomia, cap. 14 (1740), p. 241.

[1079] Ibid., cap. 10, p. 233.

[1080] If the ascription of this Commentary to Michael is correct, probably either he wrote it toward the end of his life or Sacrobosco composed the Sphere fairly early in his career, since he appears to have outlived Michael and to have composed his Computus ecclesiasticus or De anni ratione in 1244: see Duhem III (1915), p. 240. The lines quoted in DNB “John Holywood or Halifax” as on his tomb in the cloister of the Mathurins and as having reference to the date of his death are really the verses at the close of his Computus ecclesiasticus:

“M Christi bis C quarto deno quater anno De Sacro Bosco discrevit tempora ramus Gratia cui dederat nomen divina Johannes,” etc.

Cantor II (1913), p. 87, however, speaks of two different tomb inscriptions given by Vossius and Kästner but says that they agree on 1256 as the date of Sacrobosco’s death. The first line above quoted is sometimes interpreted as giving the date 1256 rather than 1244.

[1081] In the editio princeps of 1495 the marginal heading is, “Quid de planetis sentiunt theologi,” but in the text we read “thrologi,” which is possibly derived from “asthrologi” by a dropping off of the first syllable.

[1082] Edition of 1495, fol. b-ii, verso.

[1083] Strasburg, 1622 and 1659.

[1084] And is not a chapter from the Liber Introductorius; see Brown, 77-8.

[1085] Liber Magistri Michaelis Scotti in quo continetur Magisterium, No. 44 in a MS belonging to the Speciale family. I have not seen the MS. It is described briefly by Brown, 78-80; see further S. A. Carini, Sulle Scienze Occulte nel Medio Evo, Palermo, 1872.

[1086] See bibliographical note at the beginning of this chapter.

[1087] This expression occurs in the course of the text itself--Corpus Christi 125, fol. 97r--in addition to the words scratched in the upper margin at the beginning by another hand, “Michael Scotus Theophilo Regi Saracenorum.” The conclusion of the treatise is in a 14th century hand, the remainder in a 15th century hand.

[1088] See bibliographical note at opening of this chapter.

[1089] Brown, p. 91, citing Wadding, I, 109.

[1090] Brown, p. 91, note 2.

[1091] Berthelot (1893) II, 74 and 77; Lippmann (1919) 481. I doubt if there is much ground for their further assertion that such clerics fell easily under suspicion of heresy and hence wrote in ciphers like Roger Bacon’s for gunpowder. At p. 688 I have refuted the notion that Bacon employed a cipher to conceal the recipe for gunpowder.

[1092] In his fourth chapter, “The Alchemical Studies of Michael Scot.”

[1093] If the title of any book were meant, it would rather be Michael’s own De secretis naturae, since he not only says, “Cum rimarer et inquirerem secreta naturae ex libris antiquorum philosophorum....,” but also, “Quedam extraxi et ea secretis nature adiunxi....”

[1094] P. 92.

[1095] P. 240, “Et notum est quod sicut 7 sunt metalla ita 7 sunt planete et quodlibet metallum habet suum planetam,” etc.

[1096] For Latin text see Brown, p. 248. The same passage occurs in another alchemical treatise, Liber Dedali philosophi, which Brown printed on opposite pages to the text of the Liber luminis luminum.

[1097] Corpus Christi 125, fol. 99v, “et ego multotiens sum expertus,” fol. 100r, “Et ego michael scotus multotiens sum expertus,” etc.

[1098] Brown, p. 262, “Vitriolum nigrum apportatur de Francia et idcirco dicitur terra francigena. Cum isto mulieres vulvam constringunt ut virgines appareant. Non est autem magne utilitatis in ista arte.”

[1099] Corpus Christi 125, fol. 99r.

[1100] Ibid., fol. 100r, “Et ego vidi istam operationem scilicet apud cartanam a magistro jacobo iudeo et ego postea multotiens probavi....”

[1101] Brown, p. 252, for Latin text.

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